Recoil Management

There is a lot of advice out there on managing recoil, most dealing with the handgun. So, naturally, I will start off by recommending an article on managing recoil with a rifle. Why? Because marksmanship principles start with shooting a rifle. 

    The article to which I want to direct your attention is "Recoil Management" by Caylen Wojcik published at the Journal of Mountain Hunting. He explains:

    What is recoil management? Effective recoil management is using our bodies’ mass and bone structure to absorb the recoil energy of a rifle and transfer that energy throughout the body so that the shooter can easily re-acquire a second sight-picture after the process of recoil and follow-through is complete. More on that second sight-picture shortly. Of course, rifle setup is a very important factor here but plenty of people go about this process in the wrong way. First and foremost, the rifle scope’s eye-relief should be set for the shooter in a “middle-ground” shooting position as I like to think of it. What I mean by that is we can’t set optimal eye relief for just one shooting position if that rifle is meant to be used in a variety of positions.

The author warns about shooting too much gun, noting that if the rifle has so much recoil you don't want to shoot it, you will never be able to shoot it well. He continues: 

    The goal in any shooting position is to apply the seven factors common to all shooting positions (see below) and get the body square to the rifle so we can present as much mass as possible behind the rifle to absorb and spread that recoil energy. What this is doing is reducing the amount the rifle is going to move during the recoil process. I can’t stress how important this is in becoming an independent shooter. If, after you fire at your target and you recover from the recoil, your rifle is pointed at something 20-feet to the left of your target there’s no way you’re going to be able to process the vital information the bullet is telling you, especially if you’re solo and don’t have an observer. Besides, an observer should be looked at as an added bonus, only telling you what you already know. After all, whose perspective is going to be the most accurate? Yours, looking at what you just shot at, or theirs sitting a couple feet away?

    Another contributing factor to effective recoil management is a proper natural point of aim (NPOA) for that particular shooting position. If you have a solid NPOA, the rifle is going to go through the process of recoil, but it will ALWAYS recover to where the rifle naturally wants to point. It’s all interconnected, and there’s no getting away from applying ALL the fundamentals.

 In other words, we want to (a) get as much mass behind the rifle as possible to absorb recoil from (b) with a weapon set up to shoot from a variety or positions (or situations) and (c) with a natural point of aim (NPOA) such that the rifle will recover to where the rifle naturally wants to point, which should be aligned with your target.

    Moving on to the handgun, let's start with an article from the Shooter's Log by Bob Campbell entitled "How to Control Recoil When Shooting a Handgun." Similar to Wojcik, above, Campbell also warns about trying to start out with too much gun:

    Some calibers are just too much for the occasional shooter. Working people on a budget (in terms of time and money), should not jump into the .357 SIG, 10mm, or a lightweight magnum of any type. It is a process to learn to control recoil. Once you have thoroughly mastered the .38 or 9mm, you may wish to move up in caliber. But not before you have mastered the standard calibers.

    I have trained quite a few shooters and attended many classes as a student. Firing a pistol and hearing the report a few feet in front of your eyes isn’t a natural thing. Recoil control must be learned. Many focus more on recoil than on marksmanship. The greater the concentration on marksmanship the less you will notice recoil.

    Flinching, and failing to control recoil, kills accuracy. Failing to control recoil makes accurate follow-up shots impossible. In a defensive encounter — if you fire accurately— you will probably solve the problem without using the full gun load. However, chances are you will need more than one shot. Handguns just are not that impressive concerning wound potential. Likewise, there is the problem of multiple assailants. This means you must learn to control recoil effectively. 

With rifle shooting, the majority of the recoil energy will be through the weapon's stock into the shoulder. With the handgun, the majority of the recoil energy will go into the hand. The goal for proper recoil control is to take that energy going into the hand and transfer it somewhere else. 

    I had linked to a video not too long ago where the author showed how to let a handgun with a plow handle grip roll in the hand so that the firearm absorbed most of the recoil, even letting his arm rise with more powerful loads. And that is one way to transfer the recoil energy. And if you look at old photographs of shooters using revolvers, you will often see them shoot with the shooting arm bent, which allows the arm act somewhat like a spring also helping absorb recoil.

    Those methods will not work with semi-auto pistols. And allowing the revolver to roll upward in your hand won't even work with most modern revolver grips. 

    Instead, what we aim for is gripping the handgun in such a way that the recoil energy is transferred to the hand and up the arm to the shoulder, and the gun returns to a natural point of aim where it is still pointed at the target. This involves both grip and stance. 

    Starting with grip, Campbell states: "The hand should ride as high on the grip as possible with a self-loading pistol. The hand must ride high on a revolver backstrap as well — to offer good leverage for the finger to press the double-action revolver trigger, straight to the rear. But don’t override the revolver backstrap. This will result in what is called heeling." He goes on to discuss other points with your grip/stance, and includes a slide show at the bottom of the article to better explain some points. 

    Campbell's points work well for both revolver and semi-auto handguns. But the reality is that most people are using the semi-autos for self-defense and there are a few things that work well for semi-auto pistols that are not easily transferable to the revolver. So, next I would direct your attention to an article by "The Humble Marksman" at The Armory Life entitled "Practical Skills: Recoil Management for Speed and Accuracy."  And he begins by noting that recoil management involves "managing both muzzle climb and muzzle bounce (when the slide goes back into battery)." With that, he delves into the three parts of recoil management:

•     How you place your hands on the gun
•     How you hold your arms
•     How you stand (stance)

And this brings us to the NPOA issue raised as to rifles, but applying the concept to pistols. The Humble Marksman observes on this point:

    A good grip is going to reduce muzzle climb and speed up sight recovery — but there’s more to it than that. A good grip is also going to align your sights for you, so you don’t have to do it consciously (this is referred to as “index” or “natural point of aim”).

    The grip will cause your sights to behave predictably with a perfectly neutral rise and return. A good grip will make you more accurate because it stabilizes the gun through the trigger pull, making you more accurate.

    The sights lifting straight up is critically important for speed shooting. If you overpower the gun on the support side so that that sight or dot lifts up to your dominant side, when the slide closes it’s going to come down on the support side.

    Often hitting “low and left” when shooting fast is misdiagnosed as a trigger control problem when it is actually a grip-imbalance problem. The problem is it’s nearly impossible to see this on a set of iron sights.

The remainder of his article is on how to properly grip the pistol, so be sure to check it out. See also Michael Seeklander's article, "6 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Recoil Control With A Handgun" who also covers some finer points of a good grip; and Richard Nance's article at Handguns Magazine, "How To Properly Grip A Pistol: Step-By-Step Instructions"; and Dave Spaulding's Guns and Ammo article, "Proper Combative Pistol Grip (And A Whole Lot More)."

    Those of you that teach may find this PDF from NRA Online Training showing a two handed grip useful to hand out to your students although the revolver grip appears to be too low on the grip.  

    Finally, most of the articles I came across assumed a two handed grip on the weapon. But there are many situations where you might have to shoot a handgun with a single hand. Dan Abraham has an article and video at The Armory Life: "The Art of One-Handed Shooting."