how to shoot?

[Ian]

What is the correct position for a tactical shotgun, is it the shoulder or nearer to the elbow?

[ChuteTheMall]

shoulder

[Ian]

Thank you. Although I am completely oblivious to recoil in a handgun (380, 9mm, 40, 45 all feels the same to me) I seem to be sensitive to the recoil of the shotgun.
One time I shot my friend's, it hurt, and I don't know how, but nearly broke my nose :embarassed:
Another time was at a trap shoot, (it was necessary for the NRA instructor course) I had a 50% hit rate, but my shoulder really ached afterwards, and I am sure that it must be a lot worse with 00 buckshot.

[Skpotamus]

I'm an NRA instructor, most of my teaching is done at a boy scout camp with younger kids (13-15ish age group), although I have done a bit of teaching with older students as well (45 was the oldest).

The stance I teach my kids and that the NRA taught me is pretty simple.

First off, let's find your sweet spot. Stand in a natural stance with your hands at your side. Take your shooting arm (trigger finger side), and make a chiken wing, feel for the soft pocket between your shoulder and your chest, and below your collar bone. If you push around with your fingers, you'll find the spot that doesn't hurt when you push hard, that's where the gun goes. Keep your body square to your target, if you turn your hips, the pocket goes away and the gun is against your shoulder, which hurts.

Take a short step forwards with your non shooting side foot (a half step), just enough to get your weight forward without having to turn your back foot (a little bit of turning is OK).

Bend your knees and lean forward so that your weight is forward, all of your movement (following, raising, lowering, etc) is done with your hips.

Your non shooting hand is positioned so that it is under the forearm, with your index finger pointing towards your barrel (when I'm making my students follow clays, I make them do it palm up, just like they hold the shotgun).

Your shooting side arm should have the elbow up, so your arm is parallel to the ground.

Your cheek should rest comfortably and solidly on the shotgun. If it is making solid contact, your whole body and gun will act as one unit during recoil. If it's not making solid contact with the shotgun, you can get punched in the nose or cheek by the gun during recoil.

This isn't a very good explanation, but I'm kinda tired :)

If you are positioning your shotgun correctly, you can shoot for a LONG time without feeling any pain at all. The only discomfort you should ever feel is your non shooting arm getting tired from holding the gun up.

I had two 13 year olds this last summer shoot 250 rounds thru the course of a week while trying to get their NRA Expert Qualification. This was the first time they'd ever fired a shotgun. They hit 196, and 197 out of 250 respectively. These kids were about the same size as an adult shotgun with a 28" barrel. They had to fire in complete rounds of 25 shots each. I was very impressed with those kids.

[Ian]

Very impressive, thanks. I had a feeling that our instructor wasn't all that good.
I couldn't understand how he could qualify instructors in Handgun, shotgun, rifle, etc etc without taking us to the range.:upeyes:

[B+Shooter]

The two biggest problems I have seen with people shooting shotguns is
1. People tend to not lock the stock into their shoulder. The tighter it is, the less it hurts. I have seen shooters try to hold the shotgun away from their shoulder because it hurts, which in turn gets momentum and hits the shoulder even harder. Lock it in tight!

2. Get a good agressive lean forward. Shifting the weight forward lets you maintain balance after your shot for followthrough. If you get rocked back by the shotgun, you can't move/transition/aquire new targets until you regain balance, which make you lose valuable time.