When to reset trigger

When firing a shot, should the trigger be held against the stop during follow thru ?
Thanks, Scott

During follow through you don’t want to disturb the gun.  So no movement of the trigger finger. 

The next question is what is adequate follow through?  Lots of answers, most of them wrong.  For me adequate follow through is to not disturb the gun hand/arm/body tension until the gun reaches full recoil.  After that you have no more influence on the bullet placement.

jscot111 wrote:When firing a shot, should the trigger be held against the stop during follow thru ?
Thanks, Scott

Don’t hold it back! 
HM’s pull the trigger and release the trigger. It’s all about finesse. When you squeeze/pull the trigger it’s with finesse and when you release the trigger it is with finesse. Its not a rushed motion, the shot breaks and the trigger is to the rear. You will have a minor pause, but do not exaggerate the hold. It’s the same for SF, TF and RF. If you do something different for each one you’re doing too much. 
When squeezing the trigger the trigger finger is acting individually separate from gripping fingers. But when applying trigger pressure it does help to stabilize the pistol. If you hold to the rear you can start developing a habit of getting your trigger finger to start acting like a gripping finger. 
If you jerk the trigger no amount of follow through is going to help! 
If you watch Henderson and Zurek fire a SF shot, they are back on target prepared for a 2nd shot immediately even though they are only executing one shot. They use the same process for all courses of fire.
I think follow through is overrated. When you break a shot you should know by the look and feel of the shot if it’s a 10 or not. I have a torn labrum and cannot hold long after a SF shot. I truthfully put the gun down pretty fast. The shots are on call! I never blame a poorly executed shot on lack of follow through. Yes I wish I could hold longer after the shot, but a full 2700 kills me.

Next time you dry fire try breaking shot without holding trigger to the rear, and then holding to the rear. Which one feels the best? I’d like to know?

Jon

Jon Eulette wrote:Don’t hold it back!

I have heard Jon Shue and William Bethards call it ‘Outback. Your favorite restaurant.’  How they explained it to me is gun goes bang, you let the trigger Out to reset it and then you start bringing it Back (i.e. squeezing).  I have read other HMs on this forum say it as 'keep the trigger moving'.

It is something I am still working on.

Dear OP:

Many people have different definitions of "follow through" and how long and what that actually entails.  For me, it's not standing there like a statue waiting for the pigeons to land, but it does mean that I'm still driving the gun to the center of my aiming area even as the trigger process and shot is completed, the bullet is on its way and the gun starts to rise. It does go past the thought and action of tripping the sear.  

Your question may be better stated and more informative if it were revised to:

When firing a shot, how long should the trigger be held against the stop during follow thru or more precisely after the cartridge is actually fired?

(For me) As long as needed to ensure I have completed the trigger process to the best of my ability to see the front sight or dot start to rise in recoil from the place in my aiming area where the shot went off, with exactly the same pressure as it took to break the shot.  This is (for me) a very short time, but it ensures that one does not "light finger" or "jerk" the trigger when completing that part of the shot process and that I remain focused on seeing the shot (to ensure I can call it correctly). Then I move on into reset and recovery consistent with my shot process. This happens in a very short time.  But remember, too many things happening all at once creates confusion, many things done sequentially within a very short time and with purpose creates consistency.

CR

Looking for the reset during recoil has sent many rounds into Lake Erie.

Sounds like some people confuse "reset" with "trigger process"!  "Reset" (for me) is going forward to reconnect the trigger for the next shot. Starting the next trigger process is something different.  If "reset" includes taking up the slack / first stage, then these problems can occur. 

I've seen lots of shooters that jerk the trigger and then try to restart the next shot so quickly the brain doesn't seem to have time to process what their eyes are seeing to know precisely where the sights are on the target.  Add a "blink" to that process and you have people that have trouble calling the shots correctly and then they do the "scope dance" for a while! 

james r chapman wrote:Looking for the reset during recoil has sent many rounds into Lake Erie.

That would be from shooters who have not learned the process of properly executing a shot. Just because all their shots make it on paper doesn't mean they know how to properly execute a shot either. 
Poor training and poor understanding of trigger squeeze fundamentals is leading cause of wild shots. Majority of shooters I talk to "think" they are training when in reality they are just shooting. That's why majority of shooters plateau at a lower classification than they could really accomplish, they're just going through the motions.
Jon

I have trouble just thinking about this question. It is a distraction like asking a shooter or a bowler what he does with his left hand when pulling the trigger. I have no idea when I reset the trigger. I have never thought about it and don't want to start now. Release the trigger is not in my thought process. Breathing after recoil is not in my thought process either. Should I worry about when to start taking breaths again? Do you start holding your breath on ready to the left or ready to the right? Or ready on the firing line? Also not in my thought process so I don't have that answer.

Len

If releasing the trigger is in your thoughts, you are thinking too much.

Jack H wrote:If releasing the trigger is in your thoughts, you are thinking too much.

That's why we should dry fire each fundamental individually and break it down in dry practice so that when we live fire its a subconscious process. I've seen shooters let completely off the trigger and slap it for each shot and not even know they are doing it. They look at you in disbelief when you tell them they are doing this. Then by breaking it down they learn to pull trigger and reset it correctly.
Jon

I keep reading this advice from the High Masters - "focus on one fundamental at a time in your dry fire training."

Conceptually, I understand the importance and the benefit of this advice. How do you execute it in practice? Lately, I have been working on my trigger press. I do that by dry firing at a blank wall (with a dot-equipped pistol) and by paying intense attention to the feel of the trigger press and keeping the dot absolutely centered  in the tube and without unwanted sudden movements (aside from the usual dot dance) from the start of the trigger press to the end of my follow-through.

At the same time, with each shot I go through my entire shot process and try to execute each fundamental to the best of my ability: stance, grip, sight alignment, breathing - in addition to trigger press and follow-through.

I would appreciate practical advice on training each fundamental individually.

Best Regards,
Oleg.

Thats it! Intense attention on just one thing (leave out the and...) when training. When shooting for practice or match, just observe the process. When you have to consciously do something, then that goes on the list for training (like uninterrupted trigger process or keeping constant grip pressure, etc. ).

Thanks, Cecil. As usual, you put into words the thoughts, which were rattling around in my head. It has become much clearer to me now.

A professor of neuroscience at MIT, says that for the most part, humans simply can't focus on more than one thing at a time. What we can do, he said, is shift our focus from one thing to the next with astonishing speed.

Jon Eulette, Cecil Rhodes, Jim Henderson, Ed Hall and others, have been my mentors in this sport (in no particular order).

Cecil has taught me the difference between practice and training and the importance of training each aspect of a shot separately. Being the analytical type, I try to break down my shot process and follow Cecil's instructions.

In the past, I had problems with reset. In my haste (read panic) to complete my rapid fire strings, I would occasionally "double", i.e. one shot on paper (hopefully) and the next high and left in recoil.

In a post above Jon said "you will have a minor pause, but do not exaggerate the hold".

In a separate conversation, Brian Zins recently told me not to force recovery, that consistent grip and muscle tension will bring the gun and arm back, kind of automatically.

Putting this all together, my abbreviated process (for now) is as follows and it is sequential:

1-With "ready on the firing line" I inhale, raise arm to top of black, exhale partially, lower to center, and "pre-load" the trigger.
2-As the target turns, the pressure builds and the first shot goes off...X!
(here's the relevent part)
3-Ala Zins, I let the recoil happen and the gun naturally starts to come back to center. The trigger is momentarily held back. (this is where I mark the end of the shot)
4-(here is where I mark the beginning of the next shot) I consciously reset the trigger, the gun is on the way back, pointing near 10 o'clock on the black and, ala Jon, I get right back on the trigger, slow and smooth, for the next shot and it breaks as the dot reaches the middle.
5-Rinse and repeat.

Lately, two things are working really well for me. First, again ala Jon, getting on the trigger early and, second, my new mantra: "Forget the Target, Think Trigger". Some may disagree but I'm really starting to see good results by keeping all of my mental focus on the trigger and executing the process above with no thought of the target. That's not to say the target has nothing to do with it. I see it, I just don't sweat it.

LenV, No disrespect but, at this point in my shooting, and with the problems I had in the past, I feel I must include reset in my thought process. I have to break it down.

JackH, Thinking too much? Yeah, probably.

Last thought: Subconscious. Much of the written advice talks about letting each part of the process go to the subconscious. I don't disagree but, for me, at this point in my shooting career, I need to work on these things consciously. I believe, with training and practice, the subconscious will take over but I don't think it can be forced. It will happen when it's ready.

Thanks for listening. I look forward to your comments.

In thinking about "resetting" the trigger and my shot sequence, it seems there is a natural relaxing of the trigger finger which occurs during recoil and as the pistol pauses at the top of recoil reset occurs then pressure on the trigger is resumed and the following shot should come just as the gun settles in the aiming area. 

For me this is when the subconcious is control and I'm shooting well. When I think about it or conciously control it my scores go down....the history of my BE career in a nutshell !

Ron Habegger

I'll say one thing I see almost all poor shooters do is as soon as the gun fires they throw their finger forward and off the trigger.  Practically bouncing of the the trigger guard.  DON'T DO THIS!

The outstroke should be as smooth as the instroke, see Chris Cunninghams book on revolvers

First I would like to thank everyone for there advice and knowledge. I found two issues with my fundamentals. The first one was relaxing my grip when the hammer drops and not gripping the pistol hard enough from the start of the arm raise. The second one was my finger was not touching the trigger during recoil especially with the 45, I was flinging it forward in a hurry to get the next shot off. My shot process varied from SF to Sustained in regard to grip and arm tension and length of time to pull the trigger.  I now have a clue on what to work on and looking forward to shooting some higher scores.
Scott