Five Tips to Improve Your Shooting Skills
If you’re happy just going to the range every once in a while and making “expensive noise”, as an instructor once told me, then this article is not for you. If, on the other hand, you truly want to improve your skills, no matter what level you’re currently at, then hopefully this article will provide some helpful tips for you. Let’s dive in.
Master Instructor Chuck Haggard demonstrates a concept in front of students at the Tactical Anatomy Summit in Nashville, Tennessee
Get training. I don’t care how good you think you are. “I was in the military.” “I’ve been shooting my whole life.” “My uncle was a Navy SEAL and he taught me everything I need to know.” “I train all the time; I go to the range every week.” These are just some of the many excuses that are heard over and over again.
Here’s the truth: If you truly want to improve your skills, you’re going to need to swallow your pride and take a class from a professional firearms instructor. Professional firearms instructors know the safety rules inside and out and can not only explain them to you, but ensure that you actually understand them. And believe me, there’s a difference between knowing and understanding. They also know the fundamentals of shooting inside and out. They will be able to diagnose and correct problems on the spot. And they will be able to identify your bad habits that are either unsafe or preventing your progress.
Lastly, there are classes for all levels of skill. Some of my favorite classes are “beginner” classes; I learn something new every time. If you don’t know who to train with or what class to take, feel free to reach out via my Contact page; I’d be happy to lead you in the right direction. Or review my About page for an extensive list of classes and instructors I have personally trained with.
Plan your practice sessions. Create a plan for your range session. Know exactly what you are going to work on. Write it down and take it with you to the range. Shoot the drills you pre-planned and record your results. If you need help finding drills to do, Greg Ellifritz has shared many on his website (Or better yet, if you subscribe to his Patreon, he sends out a Weekend Shooting Drills every Saturday). Other great resources include Pistol Training and Tom Givens’ monthly Rangemaster Newsletter (which you should definitely read!).
Don’t get me wrong, it can be fun to just go to the range and blast away. But understand that is neither training nor practice. If you are serious about improving your skills, you need a plan.
Space out your practice sessions. This may seem counterintuitive, but allow me to explain. If you practice every single day, you will see improvement. You will also fight a lot of frustration which may inevitably lead to thinking “I’m not getting any better.” The reason for this is incremental progress versus significant progress, a concept I first learned about from a blog post by Cecil Burch.
With incremental progress, you are chipping away at goals in micro-increments. For example, you may do a drill one day in x amount of time, and the next day you shave .04 seconds off of your time, and then the next day you shave another .02 seconds off of your time. Does that seem like a lot of progress if your goal is to shave a full second off of your time? This is what leads to frustration. “I’m never going to be able to…”
Spacing out your practice sessions allows your brain to rest and recover. You will still see the incremental progress; and, you will be much less frustrated about it.
Dry fire (or dry practice). You may have heard this one before, but regular dry practice will lead to the most significant improvement. Again, it doesn’t matter what level you’re at. I have assigned dry fire homework to brand new students who were still figuring out how to hold a handgun. For them it was 1. Pick up the gun. 2. Build the grip. 3. State out loud, “This is how I hold my gun.” 4. Set it down and do it again ten times.
And the best shooters in the world do regular dry practice. It might be working on the draw stroke; it might be vision drills; it might be movement stuff. Sure, they shoot thousands and thousands of rounds a year in live fire. But the true progress comes from dry practice sessions, which can be done much more frequently and with less expense to the wallet.
How much dry practice should you do? That depends on your goals, your lifestyle, and how much time you’re willing to sacrifice. For me, three 5-10 minute focused sessions a week seems to work well. Your mileage may vary. You could also look at it as a ratio of dry/live fire sessions. For example, if you do three dry practice sessions per week and live fire once every two weeks, you’re at a 6:1 ratio. Five times a week and you’re at 10:1. Etc.
Record your sessions. This is sort of a double entendre. If you can, literally record yourself practicing. It’s 2025; I’m betting you have a smart phone. I’m betting you have it with you right now. And I’m betting it has a camera. Take it out, press record and then forget it’s there while you do your practice. Save the video so you can review it later and analyze it; or show it to an instructor who can provide you with good feedback and tips for improvement. You may find having a small, portable tripod helps with this.
The other meaning here is to write it down. Studies have shown there are benefits to physically putting pen to paper versus typing or using an app. I’m not a neuroscientist, but there is something about the act of writing things down that aids in memory retention and goal-setting and achievement.
BONUS: I have created a tool for you to do just that. It’s a specially designed notebook for recording your practice sessions.
The Dry Fire Journal is a specially designed notebook for logging your practice sessions (and it can also be used for recording your live fire sessions).
There you go; five tips to improve your shooting skills. Get training to learn the skills and identify what you need to practice. Plan out your practice sessions so you know exactly what you’re working on. Spread your practice sessions out so you don’t get overloaded or frustrated. Do more dry practice than live fire. And write it all down so you can set goals and track your progress.