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**Frank Ettin** · September 12, 2009, 12:19 PM

As Clint Smith wrote in theJanuary/February 2008 American Handgunner:

  "It's alway argued that in a fight shooters will not look at their sights. I strongly agree -- if no one has ever taught them otherwise. To say that people don't, or won't, look at their sights is wrong. People have, they will in the future, and they'll hit the...target too. The correct alignment of the sights is a learnable skill. Is a textbook perfect sight picture available in every fight? Of course not....In fairness, the sights are only part of the issue -- the jerked on trigger doesn't improve anything."  

Even when one has been taught to look at the sights, how much has he actually practiced quickly seeing the adequate sight picture and acting reflexively, without conscious thought, on the rough sight picture? As another trainer, Bennie Cooley, once told me, "It's not that I shoot quicker than you do. It's that I see quicker."

With the proper training and practice, it's amazing how fast one can acquire a flash sight picture and hit accurately. Learning those techniques and developing proficiency in the use of those techniques also gives you the flexibility to deal with targets at pretty much any distance. What would you do if you had to engage an armed threat 10 to 12 yards away and partially behind cover?  

The idea behind the flash sight picture is to focus on the front sight quickly and align the sights only as precisely as warranted under the circumstances. At distances on the order of 5 to 7 yards, when the target is the center of mass, a rough alignment will be sufficient to assure good hits (as long as you have good trigger control). As distances increase or the target shrinks, the alignment needs to be more precise.

And whether you use the sights or point shooting techniques to direct the muzzle of the gun in line with the particular part of the target you want to hit, if you don't have trigger control, your muzzle will not be in line with the part of the target you want to hit when the bullet leaves the barrel of your gun -- and you will miss. But if you have controlled the trigger properly, you will hit.

September 12, 2009, 12:19 PM	#4
Frank Ettin Staff Join Date: November 23, 2005 Location: California - San Francisco Posts: 9,475	As Clint Smith wrote in theJanuary/February 2008 American Handgunner:   "It's alway argued that in a fight shooters will not look at their sights. I strongly agree -- if no one has ever taught them otherwise. To say that people don't, or won't, look at their sights is wrong. People have, they will in the future, and they'll hit the...target too. The correct alignment of the sights is a learnable skill. Is a textbook perfect sight picture available in every fight? Of course not....In fairness, the sights are only part of the issue -- the jerked on trigger doesn't improve anything."   Even when one has been taught to look at the sights, how much has he actually practiced quickly seeing the adequate sight picture and acting reflexively, without conscious thought, on the rough sight picture? As another trainer, Bennie Cooley, once told me, "It's not that I shoot quicker than you do. It's that I see quicker." With the proper training and practice, it's amazing how fast one can acquire a flash sight picture and hit accurately. Learning those techniques and developing proficiency in the use of those techniques also gives you the flexibility to deal with targets at pretty much any distance. What would you do if you had to engage an armed threat 10 to 12 yards away and partially behind cover?   The idea behind the flash sight picture is to focus on the front sight quickly and align the sights only as precisely as warranted under the circumstances. At distances on the order of 5 to 7 yards, when the target is the center of mass, a rough alignment will be sufficient to assure good hits (as long as you have good trigger control). As distances increase or the target shrinks, the alignment needs to be more precise. And whether you use the sights or point shooting techniques to direct the muzzle of the gun in line with the particular part of the target you want to hit, if you don't have trigger control, your muzzle will not be in line with the part of the target you want to hit when the bullet leaves the barrel of your gun -- and you will miss. But if you have controlled the trigger properly, you will hit.