Angle to the target

Why do international shooters tend to stand sideways and bullseye shooters stand on a 45 degree angle? Unless I have my angels screwed up. But you know what I mean.

Not all do either.

While International may be a little more biased one way and Bullseye another, there is a pretty wide range of preferences.  Some reasons that shooters assume different positions center around comfort, ability, recoil and eye dominance.   

But think about this, if the guys doing the very best are more "sideways", what does that tell you?  And the more mass you get directly behind the gun, the better you can deal with recoil.  

The main issue (in my opinion) is "comfort" or stress on the body.  Most International have been shooting / training so long that they would have less felt stress on the neck area when standing "sideways", which actually gets more mass directly behind the gun when shooting with one hand.  Most bullseye shooters tend to start in a position close to how they were shooting with 2 hands, etc., since they are not "comfortable" with the body position of a more "sideways" stance. When they start they will assume a position that "feels" better.  But quite a few will migrate to a more "sideways" than "facing" or "45 degree" stance.  Most finally get to somewhere between "45 degree" and "sideways".  But some even stay closer to "facing", especially with cross eye dominance. 

CR

Sideways the muscles in back of shoulder help more for stability.  It's a matter of conditioning, training, and as CR says comfort

I shot a few times with an ISSF coach and he had me stand sideways (bladed) to demonstrate the reduction of wobble due to the fact that my scapula was pinned against my back ribs stabilizing my arm. It did help, but my head does not turn that far and my neck hurts when trying, so for comfort, I add a slight angle to my stance and tuck my scapula in as tight to my back as I can to where my neck is more relaxed and comfortable.

He stood perfectly bladed with a max ten ring wobble at 25 yards like a machine...

We were using SCATT to demonstrate this.

Good evening,

Comfort and training are related to how much sideways you position yourself. I have been “bladed” for so long I actually shoot worse 2 handed facing the target than one handed sideways. 

This became very apparent fooling around with a couple of guys and a plate rack. I wasn’t consistently clearing it 2 handed with a revolver. Made a mental switch to shooting duel and one hand cleaned it every time. I wasn’t quite “Miculek” speed but after several runs the group of guys couldn’t believe how fast double action I could run through the plates.....several times I was done before the other plate rack shooter had 2 or 3 plates down. 

Way back I was taught to stand as sideways as possible. My air pistol coach was really strict about stance. Hard to understand WHY but several years later when recoiling pistols were started....it all made sense. Recoil is way more manageable/controllable when the stance is solid. Now the first thing I recommend to new shooters that join our club is copy what we do.There is a reason all of us stand the way we do.....4-5 weeks in and a couple of coaching sessions they are also bladed. 

It works....

As CR states, comfort is an issue. Speaking from personal experience, people with old injuries and/or chronic conditions adapt to their physical limitations.

Speaking of angle to the target,  my SCATT taught me something last week.  I like to think I am consistent about my stance and my grip.  And maybe this is primarily a function of the extremely short distance to the SCATT in the house, roughly ten meters, BUT I have noticed when I shift my position to the target, right or left just a few feet, the SCATT will record my hold outside of the black.  This emphasizes to me, that whatever your personal angle to the target, especially at the long line, it is important to make sure you keep it as consistent as you can.

Alot of Intl is SF and small caliber so recoil management is less of a concern however NPA is critical, let your body tell you where it wants to point. Anything else requires muscles that don't stay put.

I think of it a bit differently. If you blade, you are using all of your "back muscle" (not sure what the anatomical name is) with your chest muscle in a lot of tension. Early in the match this might make one more stable. But as the match goes on, and the back muscle fatigues, I've found there is more of an affect from the chest muscle "yanking" the arm and messing things up.

I prefer to think of it as balancing the muscles so that the work they do is roughly equal. many of my air pistol kids start out bladed. Some stay there, but most migrate to a slight angle. Especially when I tell them not to look sideways at the target, but to position thier head so thier eyes are looking straight forward.

It's not as much recoil control in Air / Free, as it is also endurance.  

Some sideways or bladeing allows a slight backward arch of the torso and puts some more weight from the off arm more behind the shooter, balancing the weight of outstretched arm and gun a little.   And the slight arch back moves the weight of the gun closer to the center of gravity of the body.  Makes a difference for those long shooting sessions. 

Standing facing the target requires the back muscles for support against the weight of the arm and gun against leaning forward and pulls from above the center of mass more.

In any event find what's comfortable, and then move as needed to get even more stability.  Shooting is a constant process of getting as good as we can at what we can do, then trying something a little different to see if we can get better.  Included in that "something different" is watching and asking other shooters.
CR

Fatigue management and endurance are important parts of the game. 

That's why CR and I mentioned less muscle use via npa. Natural Point of Aim. The npa also changes during the match as you loosen up. That's where the foot chalkers get messed up. At some point those floor marks are no longer right.  Close your eyes, lift, and let your body tell you where it points.