Proper stance for shorter people

[Laser Sailor]

I'm teaching a shorter girl (5'1") to shoot, both rifles and pistols, but she keeps reverting into a very leaned back ackward stance. Can anyone point me to a reference I can use to help correct her stance and allow her to handle a full size shotgun/rifle?

[barrym66]

Best way to start is to have her take a one to three day shooting class. There are plenty of great women shooters out there that are about her size, the basics are the same regardless of sex/height. (And it's not just women, I am casually helping/training a neighbor and his son, they both did the same at first).

I took my wife and two of her female co-workers to a local NSSF 'First Shots' class, then followed up with a 1 day private class from a local NRA instructor (Greg at SWDA in Temecula), that got them off to a great start. The NSSF program is very inexpensive ($35) and teaches basic safety using handguns, rifles, and shotguns. They enjoyed it so much that we are all going to Front Sight this Thursday, them for the 2 day defensive handgun class (and me to the shotgun class )

First Shots program: http://www.nssf.org/FirstShots/
NRA Women's Instruction: http://www.nrahq.org/women/
Front Sight: http://www.frontsight.com/

Good luck! And start her out with .22's, the fear of noise and recoil (and guns in general) is what causes the 'leaning back' stance, IMHO. Good luck and have fun!

[TKM]

It's a chick thing. Women tend to balance a load by leaning away from it. Find a female shooter to help with stance and such.

For some reason women think I'm making stuff up but believe my girlfriends.

[johnthomas]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I01I-LkU3jA

Check out this free youtube video series on shooting stance. Watching is a great place to start.

[Untamed1972]

I'm teaching a shorter girl (5'1") to shoot, both rifles and pistols, but she keeps reverting into a very leaned back ackward stance. Can anyone point me to a reference I can use to help correct her stance and allow her to handle a full size shotgun/rifle?

It really just comes down to a upper body stregnth, or a lack thereof. It has nothing to with height. You just have to keep traning with the proper stance till it becomes second nature and workout if necessary.

I would also suggest shorter training periods so that you dont get fatigued and fall into bad habits to compensate.

[shy 7th]

All of the olympic shooters have that leany-back stance. Seems to work for them.

[9mmepiphany]

I think that if you don't know how to correct a shooter from leaning back...other than to say, "Lean forward"...you really should have them take some instruction from a instructor that does understand stance and grip.

It isn't a female thing as many guys lean back too and it isn't a strength thing either...it has to do with Center-of-Mass and balance. The correction is simple, but you really need an understanding of the concept to show someone how to do it. It is only going to get worst as you move up to longguns.

A shorter shooter will usually require a shorter length-of-pull on a long gun to be able to mount it correctly.

[Untamed1972]

All of the olympic shooters have that leany-back stance. Seems to work for them.

They are also shooting guns that have virtually no recoil. A big prt of the forward leaning stance is about recoil control for quicker secondary sight picture and follow-up shots.

The forward lean stance is a tactical/fighting stance with different objectives than are found in pure target shooting competitions, hence you cannot always compare the two. Sometime one might do something in pure target shooting competitions for the sake of increased accuracy (which is the sole focus of that sport) that you would never do in combat style shooting or actual real combat.