I was interviewing several veterans, law enforcement, and students through our classes for this subject. We found that the all of the law enforcement and veterans had trained and practiced to shoot ambidextrous. Very few of the civilians and those that we talked about had practiced to shoot with either hand. It is not as easy as just picking up the handgun and shooting with the other hand. Eye dominance plays a major factor in which hand the shooter would naturally hold the handgun. Cross-eye domination occurs when the shooter is right handed and has a left dominant eye or the opposite with being left handed and right eye dominant.
To determine your eye dominance:
Two people stand squarely facing two to three arm-lengths apart. The first person needs to be an observer and the other member will be the eye dominance tester. Testers should extend their arms forward with the hands in front of the waist and place one thumb on top of the other one. Keeping the thumbs in place, cross the fingers of the top hand over the fingers of the bottom hand to form a small triangle. Now with both eyes open, extend the arms to eye height and look at the observer’s nose through the opening. The observer should note which eye they see looking back through the triangular opening. Then, keeping the nose centered in the opening, the tester should slowly bring the hands back to his or her face. The opening will come to the dominant eye. The observer should watch for switching between the eyes as the hands move toward the face. Go through this again with the other person and try several times to confirm the tests.
This is one of the main things that students need to learn before they go out to the range. I have gone shooting with people and they were not able to hit the targets and were frustrated. We stopped shooting and checked the eye dominance and started over. The difference is astounding. If this only happened once it would be not even note worthy, but this has happened way too many times and has validated the importance of learning which is your dominant eye.
Take some lessons from our law enforcement and military. Not everything the military does in training can be understood, but this is one of those that the civilians need to follow. One of the veterans was a pilot in the Vietnam War. His drills consisted of shooting with both hands around barriers and learning to shoot equally as well with either hand. They were using the .38 revolvers and the drills were designed to teach the pilots ambidextrous shooting depending on the cover and the location of the enemy.
To validate the testing of ambidextrous shooting we went to the range and shot 21 rounds left handed and 21 rounds right handed. Scott and I have had many contests over the years, (of which I have only won once because he had the flu and he still did not want to miss a trip to the range). This time was no exception and Scott won again. As a law enforcement officer he is required to qualify with both hands. As an instructor I have always practiced with both hands and can shoot almost equally with either hand. I beat Scott on the first right-handed target, and he beat me on the left-handed target. Each of us only had one shot that did not score and we were very close in total points.
Scott was shooting his off duty Glock and I was shooting my favorite Springfield Arms 1911. As I had no excuses he laughed and said the difference was because he had a better gun. You can tell where that conversation went.
One advantage to wearing a holster for a left-hand draw is a big advantage in driving. The Seat belt does not get in the way and the handgun is readily available for a quicker draw. When wearing a right-hand draw the seat belt has been a problem and I have to pull the sidearm and put in the center console so that access to the sidearm is not blocked by the seat belt. People also do not look at having the "Print" or the handgun on the left side as much as people normally look to the right side for the holster.
The bottom line: Get out to the range and practice. If you are afraid to shoot with the other hand, get an instructor to help watch and work with you while you go through the new shooting styles. Get with a friend and have contests to score both left and right handed shooting. Once you learn the basics, it is easier to transfer the knowledge to the other hand. It is good to practice this before you break your hand, or have arthritis and can not work the handgun with your normal hand.
If you have any ambidextrous shooting stories, please send them in, or if you have any suggestions we are always looking for good information on the training and shooting techniques.
Happy trails and keep the lead down range. Clark – Carryconcealed.net
