Shooting fundamentals

Accurate shooting comes down to five fundamentals. Stance gives you a stable base. Grip holds the handgun the same way every time. Aim lines the sights up on the target. Trigger control fires the shot without disturbing that aim. And follow-through keeps everything still until after the bullet has gone. Your trainer may teach a particular stance or grip; follow them. The principles are the same.

A good stance has your feet about shoulder-width apart, knees soft, weight slightly forward so the recoil doesn't push you back, and shoulders relaxed. Grip high on the handgun, firmly, with both hands; the unit standard requires you to fire unsupported, without resting the handgun on anything, but two hands are allowed. With a pistol, keep your thumbs clear of the slide's path, because it moves back hard when it fires. With a revolver, keep every finger clear of the gap at the front of the cylinder, where hot gas escapes.

Aiming has two parts. Sight alignment is the front sight centred in the rear sight's notch, with equal light on each side and the tops level. Sight picture is those aligned sights placed on the target. Then focus your eye on the front sight, so it is sharp and the target is slightly blurred. Your eye can only focus at one distance, and the front sight is the one that matters most.

Most missed shots are trigger problems. Press the trigger smoothly, straight back, and let the shot surprise you. If you jerk the trigger or flinch in expectation of the recoil, the muzzle moves and the shot goes low. Follow-through means keeping the sights on the target and the trigger held back until the shot has gone, then letting the trigger out only as far as it needs to reset for the next shot.

Before every shot, the unit standard requires you to identify the target, what is behind it, and where the bullet will come to rest. On the range, that is the backstop. In real life it is everything behind the target: people, houses, a road. A bullet that misses, or passes through, keeps going, and you are accountable for every shot you fire.

Use only ammunition of the calibre marked on your handgun, usually stamped on the barrel or slide. Check the headstamp, the markings on the base of each cartridge, and make sure they match. Cartridges that look alike are often not interchangeable: for example, 9 mm Parabellum and .380 ACP are different cartridges, even though both are sometimes called nine millimetre. The wrong ammunition can jam, damage the handgun or injure you.

Sipho's first ten shots at 7 metres put seven on the A3 target, mostly low and left. Anel spots a loose grip and a jerked trigger. With his grip fixed he gets nine; once he presses smoothly and lets the shot surprise him, ten out of ten. That is what the fundamentals do.

Your turn. Match each tip or mistake to the fundamental it belongs to. Answer four quick questions. Then find the calibre stamped on your handgun, or the one you plan to buy, and write it down. Next lesson: malfunctions, and what to do when a handgun doesn't fire.