Cup and saucer, 007-style. Now here’s an old school grip that we have no business teaching in the new school. This handgun grip, quite literally, needs to get a grip. He instructs people to use two handed grip in the 'Cup and Saucer' method. As I understand it, the strong hand holds the pistol high and tight while the support hand is placed on the butt of the pistol (near the magazine) in a hortional position (like a cup and saucer).
Even if you’re new to shooting, you may have heard names like,. Whether you know them from the competitive circuit, see them on shows like Top Shot, or your obsessive shooting sports fan neighbor just can’t stop rattling off stats about them, one thing is clear. They have a reputation of being experienced, no make that expert, shooters.But wait, you’re new to this whole thing. How do you make that first trip to the range, gun store, or even a friend’s house to check out a gun or two without looking like a total doofus? Admit it, we all want to be cool and look comfortable and confident when learning new and gun handling skills. Like all new things, learning how to handle guns can be intimidating.
But how do you take the first step and learn basic gun and shooting technique now that Miss Manners’ Sooper Dooper Guide to Shooting Etiquette is out of print?Check out these and you’ll be safe AND looking like an pro shooter, or at least a well-rounded intermediate, in no time flat. Gun Safety Tip: Practice ‘Open sesame’.
When someone hands you a gun, whether it’s in a store, at the range, in their house, or at an armory in Kandahar, Afghanistan, point it at something safe, like the floor, and immediately open the slide (or cylinder if it’s a ) to verify that it is in fact unloaded. Do remember to keep your finger off the trigger while doing this. That alone will get you 12 extra bonus points! But still remember, a gun is ALWAYS loaded. Even after you’ve opened it to verify that it’s empty. We know, it’s kind of confusing. Just trust us on this one.
If you pretend that it’s always loaded, you’ll never do something silly like pointing it at someone or something you really don’t want to shoot. Proper Handgun Grip: Don’t drink tea at the range. Just to be clear, a cup and saucer grip is not a compliment or indicator of social refinement. It’s an observation of poor shooting form.
If you’re going to use two hands to shoot a handgun, you might as well get some benefit out of the support hand. Rather than cupping it under the base of the grip like a teacup saucer, how about snugging it right along side the grip so your support hand fingers can reach around the front? You’ll be amazed at how little your feisty little or jumps when you use a proper grip. Every shot you fire without ear protection WILL permanently damage your hearing. And each additional shot after that WILL damage it more.
You probably won’t know it for a while. But it WILL happen. Same thing with eye protection. If you shoot, stuff WILL bounce back at you and hit you in the face. Bullet fragments. Backstop fragments. Irritable forest critters.
And who knows what else? While every shot without eye protection does not result in vision loss, it’s only a matter of time before something wrecks one or both of your eyes. They don’t react well to metal fragments and flaming powder gasses.The easiest way to spot a new, and foolish, shooter is to look for those too cool to wear shooting glasses and ear protection. There are thousands of stylish eye and ear protection options out there so you can even look cool sporting your common sense safety gear. Handgun Grip Technique: Don’t be all thumbs.
This grip technique may cause you to bleed all over the shooting range. We don’t recommend it.I can share this new-shooter tip from a vantage point of, ummm, let’s call it personal experience.Remember Ghostbusters? And how it’s really bad to cross the streams of the Proton Pack particle accelerators? Well there’s a similar rule of thumb (pun fully intended) for shooting semi-automatic pistols.
Don’t cross your thumbs. See the picture in this article? Don’t do that! Sooner or later, that thing called a slide is going zoom backwards at Warp 17 and slice the dickens out of the webby, sensitive skin between your thumb and your index finger. If you want to splatter copious amounts of blood around the range, feel free, but once is enough for me.Fortunately there’s an easy way to avoid bleeding all over your range. Don’t cross the streams. When shooting a, never cross your thumbs!
If you do, you will get blood all over your gun! Point both thumbs forward and keep them on the weak hand side of your handgun. Your hand, and your local drug store, will thank you.The video linked in Step 2 above shows excellent thumb form. Gun Safety Tip: Learn to be cold to your shooting range companionsBeing cold at the shooting range isn’t rude. Or event anti-social. In fact, it’s not, it’s cool to be kind. Kind of cold that is.How can you be cold at the range?
When you hear “Range Cold!” that means it’s not hot. Which means there is no shooting. Or even pretending to shoot. Which means put your gun on the table. Which means don’t play with it or show your friends anything about it that involves touching your gun.
The table and the gun become one. And you’re suddenly the third wheel in that relationship.
Keep it that way until you hear “Range Hot!” Then, and only then, you can try for a threesome with the gun / table love festival. When the range is cold, do NOT touch your gun. Step away from the shooting table until the range is hot. Bonus tip: If you want to look like a real pro, then don’t just put your gun(s) on the table when you hear “Range Cold!” Step away from the shooting table and stay there the whole time the range is cold. This is a sooper dooper move that let’s nearby shooters know that you are not messing with your gun(s) while the range is cold. It’s very considerate and they will love you for it.
You might develop your own new relationship while your gun and the table are focused on theirs. Shooting Terminology Tip: Ban the word “Clip” from your vocabularyYou know how you can spot a high school prom couple at an exclusive restaurant? Like when the pimply mannish boy requests A-1 Steak Sauce with his Chateaubriand?
Well, there’s a similar thing in shooting – when people carelessly throw around words like clip.Clips and magazines are both legitimate shooting related objects. While sometimes subtle, there are differences.A clip is a device used to hold cartridges for the purpose of storage, packing, and easy loading into a magazine. Clips were a big deal back when the world had anger issues expressed by frequent large-scale wars. Five or ten rounds of might be attached to a clip, which would allow a soldier to slide the rounds into the magazine of his rifle or handgun quickly and easily. Clips are still used today. Some.223 or 5.56 comes on clips to make it easier to load lots of rounds into a magazine at once.A magazine is the container that holds cartridges for the purpose of feeding them into the chamber of a firearm. Magazines can be built into the gun, as with many rifles, or they can be removable, as with most semi-automatic pistols and AR type rifles.
That thing that falls out the bottom of a? That’s a magazine.Confused? We’ve got a near fail-safe tip for you. These days you’re pretty safe referring to most things that hold bullets as a magazine. More often than not, you’ll be correct referring to it that way.Mixing the words ‘clip’ and ‘’ in the same sentence is a sure-fire way to show you’ve still got a few things to learn. Shooting Tip: Don’t do The BernieWhile the movie Weekend at Bernie’s qualifies a cult movie and spawned it’s, it really doesn’t play well at the range. Dancing tends to throw off your aim.Nor does leaning way, way, way backwards when you shoot have any practical value.
You see, there is little chance that your gun will suddenly turn around and start chasing you, so the backwards lean position really provides no tactical advantage. Leaning backward while shooting a provides no tactical advantage. And it makes you look like a n00b! if you want to look awesome and skilled like the pro shooters, lean forward into the gun, and towards your when you shoot. If your shoulders are just a tad in front of your belt buckle you’re in great position. Not only do you look tough, all that aggressive body position really helps to control recoil and keep your shots on.After all, you never see Chuck Norris leaning away from those nameless henchmen do you?
Last but not least: Don’t be shy about asking questions!The best way to look like a pro shooter? Even if you’re new to the whole thing? Ask questions! If you’re not sure about something, just ask. You can even ask a pro.
We’ve found them to be nice and helpful folks. One of the most pleasant surprises from getting involved in the shooting community has been the overwhelming friendliness of the people. You just might be surprised how far people will go to help a new shooter.Have fun, be safe, and ask a question if you’re not sure!Be sure to check out our latest book,. It’s available in. Back in the 60’s and 70’s the little thing that held bullets and clipped into the weapon was referred to as a clip.
If it was permanently mounded on the weapon it was a magazine. Don’t go around telling us old timers that we don’t know what we are talking about. If you are teaching brand new people on weapons it’s ok to get them mind set on magazines but out of respect for people who have been around longer than you.
You could mention some of your elders still occasionally refer to them as clips. Thanks for the note!
Some thoughts:The sight will always wobble on the target. The idea is (through practice and good grip and form technique) to decrease the radius of the wobble and smoothly release a shot while the sights are in an acceptable area of the wobble zone. Not to try to “time” a quick shot at the instant the sights are perfectly aligned, but to get better and better at decreasing the amount of wobble so a smoothly fired shot will hit somewhere in that small wobble zone. Over time, your wobble zone will get very small, so any shot in that will be “right on target” from a practical perspective.There are a gajillion minor varieties of grip, but most all focus on a method similar to the video that Pro Shooter Doug Koenig demonstrates in the link in this post. Firm strong hand grip with support hand properly placed. Some like equal pressure for strong hand and support hand and others like to “push” a little with the strong hand and “pull back” a little with the support hand to create some stabilizing tension. No single right answer, just experiment to see what works for you.What you don’t want to do is use the teacup to get on target and then switch to a firing grip.
But I may have been misunderstanding your question ?Keep working on that grip per the video and focus on a really smooth (not quick and jerky) trigger pull and you’ll be jazzed about how your shooting improves!Thanks for the question! One of the main reasons we do this is to help share best practices and teaching in a non-threatening, non-judgemental, but fun and entertaining way.Have fun and safe shooting! Magazines have followers, that is what distinguishes them. The entire rigmarole about clips and magazine is a source of irritation since people who don’t know the difference between the three kinds have force redundant language in the form of “en bloc clip” and “stripper clip” when it’s technically clip and charger.When a new shooter mixes them up I’m not surprised or offended any more than someone saying “stomach” when they mean “abdomen” or “skull” when they mean “cranium”. The purpose of language is to convey information. If the receiver understands the message then the sender has done a proper job.As for the finger on trigger, the rule is keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target. As you don’t point guns at anything you’re not willing to destroy I would have to know if the sights were on the target before being petty about index,The combined tension of the two arms is what stabilizes the pistol, tea cupping does not provide the tension needed.
I am walking proof of the value of hearing protection. When I first started shooting if there was such a thing as hearing protection, no one I knew wore it or even talked about it. In fact, In the USMC, a shooter was discouraged (read screamed at by the RSO) for putting cotton in his ears.
“With that s t in your ears you can’t hear the range commands. If the Marine Corps wanted you to have s t in your ears they would have issued you some.”My cousin worked the flight line as an aviation ordinance man w/o hearing protection and wound up with a hearing disability retirement from the Marine Corps. Those funny mickey mouse hats they wore?
That wasn’t hearing protection, those were radio headphones for communication because it was too noisy to hear anybody talking or even yelling.Even on the police range as a civilian some years later while I favored cotton, some officers stuck.38 special cases in their ears for hearing protection. I always thought that might actually accentuate the sound of the gunfire. Now some 62 years after sending my first round downrange I am not stone deaf — not yet anyway, but you had better be looking directly at me and speaking in drill sergeant tones in order for me to understand what it is you are mumbling. The interesting thing is that loud noise is actually painful these days. I wear two sets of 31 nr rated hearing devices in order to be able to shoot at a local indoor range, otherwise I can’t stand to be in there. I used to be a grip snob.
But eventually I decided if a goofy grip whether it be the sissy tea cup or gangsta one handed sideways grip, if it works for the shooter, makes them more comfortable and they can hit what they are shooting at, why should I care. Remember that guy on top shot season one. He would not give up his tea cup grip no matter how much his team mates and instructors tried to “correct” him. The guy was comfortable shooting his way and was holding his own in the competition. If it is a first time shooter or someone that seams to be having trouble hitting the target or controlling recoil, I will suggest a proper grip but if they are doing well I don’t see a problem if they don’t mind the occasional teasing that comes along with a funny grip.
Well, times have obvious changed! In the ’70s and ’80s, the Army referred to clips for pistols and magazines for rifles. And they taught the “saucer” two-handed grip, but with the support hand clasping the bottom of the shooting hand with first two fingers wrapping around the front of the shooting hand. I still shot expert as a cop, and it was comfortable for me, but I appreciate hearing about the other way of doing a two handed grip. LOL personally, I Needed it with my S&W 629.44 (6″ barrel) that was my “back-up” during hunting season in the far north.
I was a seasoned hunter and shooter when most of you were in diapers. You wanna make an issue of “clip” or “magazine”?
For most of my life if you had a rifle or handgun that didn’t load one at a time then you had a weapon that loaded with a “clip.” Everybody understood what you meant and that was that. A “magazine” was something you read in the barber shop. Before you mall internet ninjas lecture about “clip” or “magazine” you should figure out the difference between “caliber” and “cartridge.” That could be useful.
When you correct somebody with more miles on them then you have, you have just demonstrated that you are a punk with internet experience and a lack of life experience. Thank you for the article it was a great article, That being said I’m really curious with the English language having so much slang, Why does it really matter (to other than some English perfectionist moron) whether you call a magazine a magazine or clip? Honestly it doesn’t and any true gun person would know what they mean.
![Cup and saucer graph Cup and saucer graph](http://hellinahandbasket.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/off-hand-cup-and-saucer.jpg)
It can be classified either way. A clip a magazine who really cares that much and is that petty over something so minute. Honestly those are the people that are destroying this country. Clearly you are not a revolver or big magnum handgun shooter, as gripping the firearm as you suggest will result in injury. Leaning back with a heavy revolver (ie BFR in 45-70) will help you stabilize it and allow you to rest your elbows on your chest further balancing and stabilizing a nearly 4 lb handgun that’s going to kick hard enough to make you feel like you caught a fast pitched hardball bare handed (ie 500 S7W mag). My M1 Garand will be hard to shoot with out a CLIP since a have a box full of clips, what do we call them now?and though I don’t do a Bernie, I bet you dance if you get a freshly spent 10mm case down your shirt. Or as a shooter on the table next to me did, a.308 win in the but crack while he was bent over shooting (man did he move fast).
In reference to #2 Don’t Drink Tea at the Range. The USAF still teaches the cup and saucer technique. I used it for 23 years as a law enforcement specialist. We were told the method you mention, shooter’s hands fight one another throwing off accuracy. I went through an officer survival course with Las Vegas Metro and they taught cup and saucer for another reason. While firing using an object as support, like a vehicle, you do not want your weapon resting directly on it.
Interesting none-the-less.
Not a big tv watcher but got into Top Shot. I googled 'Jay Lim' because of his teacup grip and there are forums full of people making fun of him for it. I get he's not a team player and has a 'know it all' attitude but I think people are shortchanging him on his pistol shooting ability.Old, antiquated, inferior 70's technique? But consider what a teacup grip really is? It is strong hand only shooting with your support hand mearly supporting the weight of the gun to fight off fatigue. So basically you have all of the downsides of one hand shooting without any real upside.
The major downside being a slower rate of follow-up shots due to lessened recoil management (flip and lateral).Jay Lim has preformed well with this technique. To me this means that he is shooting at marksmanship standards similar to the other guys but with only one hand!As a bit of evidence that teacup is practically one handed shooting: when he was shooting a glock 17, he complained about shooting low and left. How many folks on this board have seen shooters new to glock shoot fine with a PROPER modern 2 handed grip but start shooting low left when shooting right hand only?
The issue is trigger control and he lacked it for the glock trigger! A modern two hand grip, which he doesn't have, lets you get away with being a bit lazy on the trigger. This is why I strongly believe any range day should be at least 50% strong/support side shooting.I know if he had to do speed shooting, timed target transitinging, or shooting under physical stress his competitiveness would go down the drain. But as far as basic marksmanship fundamentals go (minus the grip), I think he's gtg.
After the show's over and if he willingly learns modern technique, I've got a feeling he'll be a great shooter. That said, his attitude sucks, I can't stand much less respect people like that. He needs to fix that first.It pisses me off that so many folks ridicule him when he's actually got his fundamentals down well enough to to compete at this level without even having a proper grip.Any thoughts on this?Last edited by sboza; 04-16-11 at 00:38.Reason: I tried to post to general forum but was not allowed. Since this relates to tactics, I hope it is appropriate here.when he was shooting a glock 17, he complained about shooting low and left. How many folks on this board have seen shooters new to glock shoot fine with a PROPER modern 2 handed grip but start shooting low left when shooting right hand only? The issue is trigger control and he lacked it for the glock trigger!He's an example of 'you don't know what you don't know'. When he said on the show 'The Glock shoots low and to the left for me' he was actually blaming it on the gun, not on his lack of ability.
Someone with a reasonable amount of knowledge about shooting would know that the reason this is happening is because he's jerking the trigger, but he's too much of a know-it-all to realize it. He barely scraped by in some of those shoot-offs, especially the one with the Glock.On top of all that, he's an annoying little prick. I know if he had to do speed shooting, timed target transitinging, or shooting under physical stress his competitiveness would go down the drain. But as far as basic marksmanship fundamentals go (minus the grip), I think he's gtg. After the show's over and if he willingly learns modern technique, I've got a feeling he'll be a great shooter. That said, his attitude sucks, I can't stand much less respect people like that.
He needs to fix that first.It pisses me off that so many folks ridicule him when he's actually got his fundamentals down well enough to to compete at this level without even having a proper grip.Any thoughts on this?Folks wouldn't be ridiculing him if not for his attitude. Not nearly to this extent though. He has had several opportunities to learn from people who are more experienced than him and on many of those occasions he dismissed what they were trying to teach him with comments like 'Shooting is shooting, don't teach me a new way to shoot, teach me to shoot faster'. Um, that's what they were trying to do, Jay.
Many of the instructors commented about Jay's poor attitude. Yes, he did better than I would have expected but the point remains that he probably could have done better if he had an open mind to the instruction he had the opportunity to benefit from. When you come off as a know-it-all, it will generally rub people the wrong way.
Agreed rider79, he was blaming the gun for his lack of ability with the glock trigger and proper two handed grip, either of which probably would have helped him. The first thing I do when I mess something up is man-up and try and figure out how I can fix it. And if I have knowledgable folks around that are willing to help, I learn from them.He's too arrogant to even acknowledge that he is doing something wrong. I guess it makes sense, if you think you're doing everything right, you don't need advice from the experts.I don't have respect for that attitude and he has to change that before he can get better. But I still think he shoots pretty well for the crap grip he has.Last edited by sboza; 04-16-11 at 10:20.Reason:. Folks wouldn't be ridiculing him if not for his attitude.
Not nearly to this extent though. He has had several opportunities to learn from people who are more experienced than him and on many of those occasions he dismissed what they were trying to teach him with comments like 'Shooting is shooting, don't teach me a new way to shoot, teach me to shoot faster'. Um, that's what they were trying to do, Jay. Many of the instructors commented about Jay's poor attitude.
Yes, he did better than I would have expected but the point remains that he probably could have done better if he had an open mind to the instruction he had the opportunity to benefit from. When you come off as a know-it-all, it will generally rub people the wrong way.Yep he wouldn't try what JJ Racaza was trying to teach him. For those that don't know it JJ is one of if not the fastest Open division handgun shooters in the world and was trying his best to help Jay.
Jays ego couldn't handle it and Jay says 'Just show me how to shoot faster'.idiot.