Duelist Beginner needs advice

[ventura]

Hi folks,
I am now in month 10 of my first year of CAS. Recently I have converted to shoot duelist two handed. I'd like to request any advice for a beginning two handed duelist to learn the trade.

Thanks everyone.

Keep your nose in the wind and your eyes along the skyline.....

[sweettooth]

I would also be interested in any comments. As I understand it a duelst shoots one handed but not both hands .So a strong side and cross draw rig would work.
  What is the most used gun rig for this class . 2 strongsides ? then trnasfer ? strong side  crosss draw ?  Double cross draw
 It seems a little more authentic to me than using 2 hands on a light load wheel gun and trying  to make it perform like a 1911.
 Is this a popular category ? Tell the newbis . S.T.

[Tensleep]

Ventura, do you mean shooting double duelist?
Shooting one with the left and one with the right?
Not gunfighter, but one pistol at a time?

JM Brown of North Carolina is one of the finest double duelist I have had the pleasure of watching.
He says that it takes practice and lots of it, but is much faster than changing hands.
If the pistols are to be shot back to back, JM's hands are on both pistols and when the first is shot empty and being holstered the second is being drawn and cocked ready to fire.

It is most impressive to watch.

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[Missouri Marshal]

Been shootin duelist fer almost 3 years.  I shoot strong side only, not double duelist.  Too slow with my left hand.  I prefer the cross draw, don't like transferring to my strong hand, but ya have to be really careful about the 170.  If yur shootin double duelist, right and an left hand holsters are the best way to go.  If yur usin a cross draw make sure there is no more than a 30 degree angle on it when worn.  I've seen some that were almost horizontal and you will sweep someone with them.  Next to Gunfighter, double duelist is the toughest style to shoot then regular duelist.  Most people have to re-grip after each shot due to cocking with the thumb of the hand yur holdin yur gun with.  Only thing else I can say is practice, practice, practice.  Good luck and have fun.

[ventura]

Ten,
Yes I am shooting with my left and my right hand. Thanks for your input.
risin' outlaw

[ventura]

Ten,
Yes I am shooting with my left and my right hand. Not Gunfighter, (yet....) Thanks for your input.
risin' outlaw

[Marauder]

Ya got advice from the best, Macon Rounds.

Think smooth and keep the front sight on the target.

[SaukValley Sam]

Interesting topic.  I watched one gentleman at a CAS match shooting dualist left and right handed.  I asked him if he did that for a reason.  He replied that he was a lawman and they are trained to use either hand to shoot.  Got me thinking that any oldtime gunfighter who lived by the gun might just want to be able to shoot accurately offhand in case the strongside was disabled.  Make sense??  I also am just starting in CAS and am planning to shoot this way.

[L.G.]

I started out shooting duelist, one strong side and one crossdraw holster.  It felt good and natural to shoot a single action pistol with one hand, and didn't have any issues with being careful about the 170 degree rule.  Things went smooth right up to the day when I pulled the same pistol twice (there was both rifle and shotgun rounds between pistols)!  Then I went double duelist with 2 strong side holsters.  That only lasted a little while before I went gunfighter, haven't looked back since as it just tooo much fun!

[Lars]

I had to switch to shooting revolver one-handed last year, thanks to age and injuries. So, I now shoot with left hand instead of right, as well as left eye instead of right. Learned a few basics all over again. One is that shooting revolvers one-handed places a real premium on EVERYTHING being right. Two of the very important basics are the old standards of excellent trigger pulls and fit of grips to my hand. When I finished working on my Rugers, they are much easier to shoot accurately, as well as being much more comfortable with full loads.  Will list and describe the basics that helped me most.

1) Lots of dry fire practice, followed by live fire at paper targets. I did this both with arm supported and without support. That really taught me how much control I had to have to hit 4-6 inch targets every time at 20-50 yards.

2) Did lots of work on my revolvers to get the trigger and hammer pulls to where I could control the let-off easily and cock the hammer with minimum disturbance of aim. This ment working on the sears, NOT the springs, of the triggers -- this is NOT FOR THE INEXPERIENCED!! Ended up with nice crisp, totally repeatable and reliable trigger pulls slightly lighter than the weight of the revolvers. Hammer pulls are only slightly lighter than factory and were arrived at by slowly shortening the hammer springs and doing lots of practice cocking after each shortening. Since these are trail guns too, the hammer springs cannot be so light as to cause missfires in cold, nasty weather -- I also use only CCI350 primers.

3) Very careful shaping of the grips to precisely fit my left hand. This consisted of a loooonnnnnggggg series of sanding off about a mm at a time at those places where my hand pressed hard on the grips, followed by lots of dry and live firing. After a while it became obvious that what was working was that I had a firmer grip on the guns, WITHOUT needing to have a death grip on it (really important for those that have physical problems that reduce hand strength). That is, my hand and fingers had greater and greater areas of firm contact with the grip. Steadily, ease of hitting smaller targets increased, whereas felt recoil decreased as did amount of disruption by recoil of gripping of gun. The final (at least for now) result is a set of grips that still look just like they did originally, at least to casual inspection, but that fitt my left hand so much better as to be a revelation.

I have handled only one factory revolver that fitts my left hand as well as these Rugers now do.

Hope this is useful to someone.
Lars

[sweettooth]

 here here Thank you Lars  for passing on your knowledge  S.T

[ventura]

Again Huge Thanks to all this excellent advice, I can't thank each of you enough.

risin' outlaw