I was trained to transition to my off side shoulder and still practice it occasionally, but it isn't something I'm likely to do. My days of prowling around hunting for people with a rifle are over. If you are coming to ME and I'm armed with a rifle, my cover will all be right hand friendly...

I also occasionally practice firing a rifle one handed in the event the other hand is otherwise occupied or injured. I'm not talking precision fire at 200yds, more along the lines of clearing a room and something bad happens. This is an area a SBR has an advantage. It's easy to keep a short AR tucked up against the shoulder one handed while opening doors, moving friendlies out of the way, or eating your tactical sandwich.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
But if someone becomes injured to the point of being unable to fire a long gun from the dominant shoulder, how likely is it that he would even be able to switch to the other side, much less deliver accurate fire that way?

I have attended a number of training courses with Rifles Only, based in southern Texas. It's not everyone's cup of tea. Jacob Bynum (owner of RO) trains a bunch of military, LEO, contractor, and alphabet agency folks. The techniques he uses for the professionals spill over to the public courses. RO's introductory courses can seem to be basic and repetitive to some shooters. But if one learns the fundamentals, is safe, and doesn't act like a dickweed, Jacob allows weekend warriors into the more advanced courses. In these more advanced courses, civilians shoot along side contractors and LEOs.

In a 5-day advanced carbine course, we worked on one-handed shooting of ARs behind barriers. Jacob stated one of his military students used the techniques we learned to stay in a battle in the sandbox. Highly doubtful I will ever employ what we did, but the process was interesting.

We started with the assumption one limb was completely useless. Jacob asked us to just put that hand in our rear pants pocket. We shot from a kneeling position, resting the rifle on a wood barrier, with no slings or bags for support. We first practiced with unloaded rifles and empty mags, both strong and weak sides. When everyone was deemed good to go, we went live fire. Each shooter had two safety observer/helpers -- one other student you paired with and one instructor. We had to start with empty rifles, grab a mag from our normal pouch location, fire a few rounds, switch mags, repeat, make gun safe. Both strong and weak side.

That done, the next step was to introduce a magazine jam. The first go was just a dud round that the instructor placed at random in our magazines. Interesting, but not a huge problem. We just had to think things through and proceed slowly.

Then came the tough one. We first learned how use the mortar technique one-handed to unjam the rifle, using dummy rounds. The instructor placed a live round with a bent/smashed case in our mags. Yep, our ARs jammed big time. I used a 16" barrel rifle with 5" can. With the stock collapsed, my AR was just long enough to rest solidly in the upright position in the stair-step barrier we used for cover & rifle support.

My partner used an SBR with an 11" or 12" barrel and a slightly shorter can. When he used my idea to lean the rifle up against the barrier, it was too short for that position. Barrel upright, his SBR began to tip backwards towards him. With a live/bent round in the chamber. I lunged forward and grabbed the SBR by the middle of the suppressor (ouch!), just prior to the muzzle covering his noggin. I the dropped the SBR to the ground, pointing it in a safe direction down range. Our instructor muttered a few choice words, cleared the SBR, called the range cold, and we all had a briefing. After that, the SBR owners had to do things a little differently than those of us with longer carbines.

IIRC my partner was an LEO from a small town in a plains state. For the rest of the course, he would only partner up with me.

I seriously doubt that I will ever use truly one-handed carbine shooting is such manner, but it was interesting to do it.

At my agency I require our are officers to shoot at least two drills every range session utilizing both primary and secondary shoulder. I also make hem do this in Low light training so they remember the controls on our light are mirror image. (work the same right or left handed). YMMV

I would not know what is all the rage, on the zuckergram, because I do not go there. An AR/M4 has so little recoil, that it can be fired from the opposite shoulder, without changing one’s firing grip. Other long guns, with higher recoil, are, of course, a different case.

My personal “ambidexterity” level is high, so I have generally totally switched hands AND shoulders, if engaging around a barricade made it seem better to do so, but I understand that a less-ambidextrous shooter might well be best-advised to keep his/her hands in their familiar positions.

quote:

Originally posted by Stinx:
At my agency I require our are officers to shoot at least two drills every range session utilizing both primary and secondary shoulder.

How do they do when shooting from the secondary shoulder? As well as when shooting from their dominant side?

In other words, if the primary objective is to neutralize a deadly target as fast as possible with accurate gunfire rather than to prove to them that they can fire the gun like that (or other reasons), are they as fast and accurate?

And no, I’m not suggesting that everyone should adopt my philosophy regarding the question, but now I’m wondering whether my observations over the past many years are typical. To put it bluntly, do we require a bit of training and practice with shooting an AR from the nondominant side because there’s a good reason for it, or is it because it was something we were required to do and, “By golly, if I had to do it, so do they”?

(Despite how confident my opinions may be, I’m always willing eager to learn that I’m wrong.)

Being able to effectivly transission a long arm to the off side won't be an issue until it is. At that point you'll find out if it would have been a helpful skill set to have.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:

quote:

Originally posted by Stinx:
At my agency I require our are officers to shoot at least two drills every range session utilizing both primary and secondary shoulder.

How do they do when shooting from the secondary shoulder? As well as when shooting from their dominant side?

In other words, if the primary objective is to neutralize a deadly target as fast as possible with accurate gunfire rather than to prove to them that they can fire the gun like that (or other reasons), are they as fast and accurate?

And no, I’m not suggesting that everyone should adopt my philosophy regarding the question, but now I’m wondering whether my observations over the past many years are typical. To put it bluntly, do we require a bit of training and practice with shooting an AR from the nondominant side because there’s a good reason for it, or is it because it was something we were required to do and, “By golly, if I had to do it, so do they”?

(Despite how confident my opinions may be, I’m always willing eager to learn that I’m wrong.)

They always do better with the dominant side. I have a few that shot equally from either side but there not the norm.

A most interesting thread. I am both ambivisual and ambidextrous. I did not know about ambivisual aspect until cataract surgery which has given me great vision in both eyes.

Whichever gun, rifle or pistol, is nearest or in my hand dictates which eye I am using. I have to consciously change eyes for aiming purposes. Or change hands/shoulders. And yes I do consider the ejection port.

Learn something every day on Sigforum. 

quote:

Originally posted by jljones:
How important is to to you to be able to shoot a modern sporting rifle from both shoulders?

I understand the tactical use of the why, but am curious to how many people actually find it to be an important skill?

I’m neither hot nor cold about the topic, but it seems people are really for it (you’re an idiot if don’t practice it) or really against it for the same logic. It seems to be all the rage on the ‘gram.

When I train at the range with pistol, I shoot SHO and WHO. It’s same when I train with a rifle.

My training has nothing to do with what social media is pushing. It has everything to do with being prepared.

I regularly train to switch shoulders. It makes sense to me considering my environment may not always provide cover to my left side. I do not switch hands as if I have 2 hands, it makes sense to me to keep those hands working the same controls they normally do. Both eyes open and my brain will at least overlap the reticle in a right eye dominant sight picture (say scope shadow causes me to focus more with my right eye). I believe this to be similar to the Bindon aiming concept often mentioned when discussing Acogs.

That said, I consider being able to run a MSR from both shoulders essential to my training. If an arm is injured, I plan to resort to my pistol which I practice with both left and right hands. I could probably pull off one handed shots with my bullpup or by occasionally letting my pistol brace contact my shoulder, but do not like the reduced control over a 16 inch gun without a support hand.

I like the thought provocation behind the question though and will at least work a few reps in my next few dry fire sessions with one hand to reevaluate.

I have a friend who was a good shooter in general , on a rare occasion would shoot a match. Either shotgun matches or PCCarbine matches. In them he would shoot everything on the left side of the stage right handed and everything on the right side left handed. Naturally he wasn’t competitive due to all the time lost switching shoulders back and forth, but it certainly was something to see and admirable from an ability standpoint. Did it because he wanted to. (And enjoying yourself is the real name of the game)

IMHO, the ability to clear type I, type II, and type III malfunctions AND be able to perform a speed, emergency, and a tactical reload are more critical than being able to shoot from both shoulders.

Just my opinion.

I didn't realize this thread was this old! Gonna add to it anyway...
I attended the first portion of a series of active shooter response classes hosted by a local SWAT team yesterday. One thing they advocated, that has left me pondering, is juggling your weapon around, depending on the way you're coming around corners, when clearing inside a structure. It has already been discussed in this thread, that sometimes switching sides is advisable, to take full advantage of cover. The guys on this team do it every time the corner dictates it. If you're right handed, and you're "slicing the pie" around a right turn, or across a doorway on your right, you're holding the weapon in your "off" hand. I found it odd that someone would choose to so frequently switch back and forth. It certainly requires that you be as proficient a shooter on your "off" side as you are with your dominant hand. The idea of the whole thing is that you're only giving the bad guy your hand, weapon, and half your head as a target, if he's around that corner, or in that room. What say SIGforum LE folks? Does anyone else employ this frequent switching, to minimize exposure? It seems to me that it would be a method employed only by highly skilled officers, as, even if you're an equally skilled shooter with both hands, it takes another measure of skill still, to be able to reliably switch your pistol and rifle back and forth like that. You gotta figure you'll approach half the doors or corners in a structure from the direction that would require a switch, so a building with eight doors/corners would require four switches back and forth. That seems like a lot of switching. Or am I wrong?

Zero - I don’t have enough time to train on one shoulder let alone two.

quote:

Originally posted by KSGM:
What say SIGforum LE folks? Does anyone else employ this frequent switching, to minimize exposure? It seems to me that it would be a method employed only by highly skilled officers, as, even if you're an equally skilled shooter with both hands, it takes another measure of skill still, to be able to reliably switch your pistol and rifle back and forth like that.

It's great for those with significant amounts of training and practice in room clearing, like SWAT guys who do it for a living.

But switching shoulders around every corner while on the move is not something that's going to be viable for the average officer. For someone who's getting just a basic baseline of training in room clearing and who doesn't have significant experience with shooting a rifle from their offside and lots of reps transitioning smoothly from shoulder to shoulder, it's more important for them to focus on properly approaching corners, working their angles, and maintaining the ability to provide accurate fire with their standard strong side than it is for them to switch sides while moving around every corner, putting themselves at a disadvantage for target engagement in order to gain another several inches of cover/concealment. That small of a difference isn't going to matter as much for non-experts.

(Yes, in an ideal world, every officer would be a master of room clearing, and would be trained to a high level to include switching shoulders and being equally proficient with their offside shoulder. I'm talking about reality, though.)

Also note that while switching shoulders with a long gun allows you to present a smaller profile around alternate side corners and cover, switching hands with a pistol in a two-handed grip does not. There's no need to swap hands when going around corners if using a two-handed grip.

Well, I’ll chime in now on the reasoning in starting this thread.

In early June, I attended a five day LE rifle class that had a significant amount of swapping shoulders. My past dominance has always been keeping the rifle on the strong side. It took some doing, but I’ve actually got pretty good at it. The logic and reasoning in the course for doing it was the mindset that officers should not be exposed to swapping shoulders out of necessity during an incident. They should be exposed to it in training prior, and should be at least familiar with it. No one has a crystal ball to know exactly what the situation or cover may dictate out of necessity.

I can’t fault the logic.

quote:

putting themselves at a disadvantage for target engagement in order to gain another several inches of cover/concealment

That's my thought on it. It wouldn't be worth it unless your marksmanship was damn near identical with your "off" hand.

quote:

switching hands with a pistol in a two-handed grip does not. There's no need to swap hands when going around corners if using a two-handed grip

These officers were of the opinion that it does make a difference with a pistol. *Edit to add that I think I agree with them, but the difference is so slight that it is splitting hairs even finer, and arguably unnecessarily. I asked my wife to take a picture of me, as soon as I could see her, as I was pieing a corner both ways. I couldn't get as small coming around a right-hand turn, as I could a left-hand turn, while holding the pistol in my normal, right-handed grip. I got that much smaller, when I switched grips. We're talking an inch of tricep/shoulder; nothing to write home about.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: KSGM,