aint that what new stances are for? and practicing the same way over and over again makes you better right?
You bring up an interesting conundrum! Perfect practice of a skill leads to perfect execution of that skill. But changes -- which may be improvements (or may not) -- obviously involve altering the way you execute that skill, thus deviating from your perfect form.
So how do you improve, and how do you decide to adopt better techniques?
That is a tough question.
Many shooters simply don't. What they're doing works well enough as far as they're concerned, and they'll keep doing that thing forever. There is a little bit of "fail" in that, but also at least some wisdom as well. The Russians have a saying to the effect that "great" is the enemy of "good enough." In shooting, however, only you can decide if what you're doing is "good enough," and you may be right, or wrong no matter what you choose.
In competitive circles, this is a lot easier to answer. Everyone watches everyone else. Everyone is constantly rating themselves against the curve. Everyone is always looking for an advantage. If someone tries something new, he'll know fairly shortly if he's beating his old abilities with that new technique. Others will see what he's doing, try it, and either adopt it or abandon it. If it is actually worthwhile, the best shooters will soon be adopting it and teaching it. Competition, while being disconnected from "real life" in some significant ways, is always a great crucible for learning and advancement of a skill.
The things learned or proven through competition results do pass quickly into the training community (where dogma steps aside to results among the more honest and thoughtful teachers at the very least), and trickles out to the larger shooting population through word of mouth, the press, and though communication centers like our forum and others.
In the end, you'll just have to try something to find out if it helps YOU, personally, be more accurate and/or faster. For some, the "unlearning" curve is too steep or is not worth the disruption of their larger "system." Thus the reason we have different schools of thought, different disciplines, different styles, etc. But time tends to erase those systems that cannot keep pace, as the generations change. (You won't see serious practical shooters or self-defense instructors using the old "duelist" stance these days ... but it took a few generations to die off.) So things tend toward an ideal over time.
Still, that doesn't stop any one person from convincing a few others to try some nonsensical or counter-productive method -- and even getting them to pay him to do so. Always do your research. Verify what anyone tells you against what you already know and what other trusted sources have to say.
