Right Handed - Left Eye Dominate

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I am going to shoot with him soon and I will give him all of your recommendations. He is a horrible rifle shot. He isn't so bad with pistols but he just doesn't seem to be able to use a rifle left handed. And... every long gun he owns is set up for a righty.

Thanks for all the replies.
 
TimM said:
And... every long gun he owns is set up for a righty.
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As for right-handed rifles and shotguns, I actually prefer them over lefty versions, as bolt manipulations/loading can be done with the strong hand. Bolt guns are a bit more tricky, but once he develops more hand/arm strength he can control the rifle with the pistol grip and manipulate the bolt with the right hand.

Or he can drop the rifle from the shoulder and use the left hand, crossing over.
 
I am right handed and left eye dominant as well.

I shoot rifles left handed, and pistols right handed. Never had a problem.
 
I am left-handed and left-eye dominant but I shoot right-handed exclusively. It's the way I learned. Being left-handed, when people try to teach you something and you attempt to do it left-handed, they generally just sort of look at you funny and tell you, "no, this way". So yeah, I need to switch. I am planning to buy a new rifle soon and hope to get it in a LH bolt so that should help. I'll probably start replacing holsters soon, too. It makes a big difference when shooting pistols or scout-style scopes/shotguns.
 
You should be shooting with both eyes open anyway and whether your left or right eye is dominant, won't make a difference.
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The dominant eye is the one that takes over when you try to focus on something (like sights). If both eyes are open and you're trying to shoot cross-handed, you won't be able to see the sights properly. And no one explained this to me when I started shooting; I didn't know what a proper sight picture looked like because I had never seen one. Same thing happened when shooting bows.

The solution is to force your non-dominant eye to focus instead of the dominant one. Generally obscure the dominant eye in some way. With handguns it's simple to cant your shooting hand some to line up with the opposite eye. For rifle shooting it's either change your eyes or change shooting hands.
 
I am RH and strongly LED, and it effects how I shoot. My bolt rifles are lefties, and I shoot all long guns left handed. I shoot Pistols and revolvers right handed, but I sight with my left eye with the Horatio Cain cant. I have zero issues keeping all my groups tight.
 
The dominant eye is the one that takes over when you try to focus on something (like sights). If both eyes are open and you're trying to shoot cross-handed, you won't be able to see the sights properly.
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Not true. I am right-handed and right-eye dominant, but because of increasing far-sightedness in the right eye and nearsightedness in the left eye, I had to start shooting with my left eye.

I trained myself by starting out closing the right eye and tilting the head slightly to the right, and over time learned to shoot with both eyes open.

I see the sights in perfect focus with the left eye, the target in perfect focus with the right eye, and the brain merges the images.
 
Give the non dominant eye a try.

One thing that is an enormous help is pistol grip. If you position your sights more or less straight in line with your arm, you will not be able to get a cross-dominant site picture. You will have to slightly cock your head just to get the same-eye's sight picture.

If, OTOH, you grip your gun so it bisects the angle of both hands and keep your head straight up, then you get two competing sight pictures.

I admit it's not quite as easy for me to get a sight picture with my left hand/eye. But it's pretty easy, and I barely practice. With muscle memory and body position, and focusing more on the target rather than sights, it might be easier than you think to use your nondominant eye.
 
I had to retrain myself to be right-eye dominant with both eyes open with a pistol. It wasn't really all that hard, after 3 or so range sessions it was second nature.
 
Concur with others who recommend shooting with the dominant eye's corresponding hand. I'm right handed, but shoot left handed with my dominant eye. My daughters have the same scenario and learned more effectively from the southpaw side. My 2 pennies.
 
Well, I assume everyone learns to shoot with either hand. But whenever I switch hands, I also switch eyes! For me, this is not difficult. This makes me wonder why all the hoopla over cross-dominant. I mean, if you can learn to use your left hand, why can't you learn to use your right eye?
 
GLOOB said:
Well, I assume everyone learns to shoot with either hand. But whenever I switch hands, I also switch eyes! For me, this is not difficult. This makes me wonder why all the hoopla over cross-dominant. I mean, if you can learn to use your left hand, why can't you learn to use your right eye?
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Perhaps because not everyone's eyes work the same way as yours do. My left eye is VERY strongly dominant and my right eye is basically non-functional. If I lost my left eye I'd probably be legally blind.

There are varying degrees of eye dominance. Not everyone is the same.
 
I'm right handed and left eye dominant, shoot long guns left handed and handguns right, always shoot with both eyes open and fwiw qualified expert for the Army.

@Gowolfpack, shooting with both eyes open will help you pick up targets much quicker, I find the biggest difference when making a shot quickly using a scoped rifle. You have a much better FOV with both eyes open.
 
I am right handed and lost my right eye at age 7. I shoot long guns lefty and pistols right handed. It is something that can be overcome.
 
TimM said:
I have a friend who is right handed and left eye dominate. He is having some difficulty shooting. Anyone else have the same problem? Is there a fix? How do you compensate for it?
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Does your friends shots hit consistently left of center on the target? Also as the target moves further away does the shot group move further from the center? I am left handed and right eye dominant due to an injury of my left eye. Try using a gun with windage adjustment (S&W 686) and move the sights left and see if this improves his shooting.
If the shots are not consistently grouped and are wild on the target there may be other issues with grip and sight acquisition that need to be addressed first.
 
Handguns are easy. The sights are far enough away that I can draw a bead using my left eye, and shoot with my right hand.

Longarms are fired from the left shoulder. Its easier than you'd think since the muzzle is being controlled by your hand with the best motor skills.

And... every long gun he owns is set up for a righty.
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So are mine:p I own ten longarms, and you wont find any ambi controls added to any of them, or southpaw guns among them. If not for the slings on the wrong side of the rifles (and lights, for those of you who use them), you wouldn't know I was wrong handed.

I am right-handed and right-eye dominant, but because of increasing far-sightedness in the right eye and nearsightedness in the left eye, I had to start shooting with my left eye.

...

I see the sights in perfect focus with the left eye, the target in perfect focus with the right eye, and the brain merges the images.
Click to expand...
Now that sounds like an awesome problem to have...
 
I taught myself to shoot left or right handed, I can aslo switch from left eye to right eye so I can change the dominant eye. Im wierd.
 
My Baby girl (17) has the same problem. She aims her pistol right handed and looks over the sights with her left eye. And you'd better run if she was shooting at you! She's deadly at 50 feet with that thing! I need to get her back to the range and let her shoot some more.
 
"...If you are left eye dominant you need to shoot left handed..." Nonsense. You shoot the way that is, um, right, for you.
I'm left eyed, shoot a long gun left, but a handgun right as well. Both with eyes open a handgun. For bullseye shooting, I move the back leg to bring the sights in line with my eye.
Tell your buddy to quit worrying about it and just shoot.
 
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