I have been reading Massad's book The Gun Digest Book of Combat Handgunnery. In the chapter on grip, he advocates the "crush grip" for shooting. In fact, he even has a picture where he illustrates the white fingernails from holding the gun in the normal "crush grip". While doing my daily perusal of the Firing Line, I ran across a video by Lurper advocating a relaxed grip a day after reading Massad's chapter. So he and I engaged in some forum conversation on the matter. I am intrigued by this--a world famous teacher advocates the crush grip, but other very good instructors disagree completely. I recognize that disagreement goes with the territory, but this is a basic fundamental, and someone should have come up with a conclusive study on this by now...?! I am astounded that something so fundamental is still a matter of disagreement! What do you think about the grip...and just as important, why? Crush grip or relaxed?

I'm no expert by any means, but I would bet that in a stressful situation, a "crush grip" would be just about automatic.

I'm not an expert by any means. That said, Mas's techniques always seem to be geared toward actual self defense...Heart pounding, white knuckle situations. As you train, so shall you perform. If you spend all your time standing calmly at a firing bench with an eggshell grip on your handgun you aren't going to perform as well when you're scared to death and unconsciously using a deathgrip. If you train with the "crushing grip" all the time your bullseye scores may suffer but you'll probably be more likely to hit near your aiming point the only time it really matters.

It seems like the argument on stance...Weaver vs. Isosceles. I've always been of the mind that you're going to be better off working with your natural reactions than working to eliminate a natural response. I think this is the basis behind the military reasoning of making recruits run to the range. Have them try to stand/kneel/lie and shoot when they're trying to overcome the effects of fatigue from a physical workout and they're not going to freak out when the adrenaline hits for real and the front sight is moving in figure eights.

As always YMMV. Try things out and see what feels good or works for you.

Prushin,
Your observation about the "heart pounding, white knuckle situation" is provocative. The same Lurper has recently posted a very controversial post on TFL claiming that bodily reactions to a deadly situation are easily controllable and shouldn't come into play. Lots of controversy in that thread, including several posts from Rob at Valhalla vigorously disagreeing. That would make Lurper's subsequent post about holding the gun relaxed very consistent with his position that there is no "heart pounding, white knuckle situation". Hmmmm, interesting.

Having participated in both bullseye (well at least a little bit) and as an almost Master Class IPSC shooter, I can tell you that both the Crush Grip (as strong as the grip used when you are pounding spikes with a 5lb hammer), and the relaxed grip are correct.

It’s a case of “horses for courses”!

If you have plenty of time to recover the gun and possibly readjust your grip, the relaxed grip will typically prove to be the one that will produce the tightest groups at 50 yards. If you want to shoot double taps at 10 yards with less than a 1/0th of a second break between them while holding the “A” zone, you are going to need to grab onto the butt of the gun or you are not going to be able to re-index for the second shot, after recovery.

I anticipate, knowing what adrenalin does to the body in a lethal force situation, you will probably feel like you are barely holding the gun but when everything calms down again I believe you will almost certainly find your finger prints are now embedded in the steel of the front strap of your carry piece.

P.S. If anyone wants to learn to shoot the IPSC way I’d be happy to put a class together once we’re looking at green grass again!

I always use a relaxed grip when either target shooting or hunting. I find I hit the best that way. Would I hold it that way in a self defense role? I have no idea and hope I never find out... Just as long as I can still hit the target.

Try six shots on a silhouette in 3 seconds at 30', from the holster!

With a S&W 500 with 1700+ FPS handloads, if you don't hang on for dear life, your knuckles will be bleeding before the box of 50 is used up...

BECAUSE of that, practically any other gun I shoot can be shot relaxed grip, except for my EAA 45 that I have worked up to 1250 FPS with 185 grain XTP's - that's still a nasty little bitch...

I am starting to practice with a crush grip. What I have noticed is that follow up shots are a good deal faster (9mm is very fast). The problem is that it takes a muscle to do this. The first few trips to the range I could shoot three rounds and then my arms would be too tired to keep the crushed grip. The trick is to relax for 10-15 seconds, bring the gun up and three more shots. Repeat for 3-5 mags. Take a 20-30 minute break. Repeat. You don't want to get too tired because then your practice will start to suck.

I have been doing push ups when I roll out of bed and some curls at night. This has helped the amount of control that I get and how long I can shoot with that grip for. It has actually changed for the better how I shoot.

How about throwing a racket ball in the console of your car. Then when you are boarded on the way to work, or maybe even mad about something, take the racket ball and start crushing it 10-20 times in each hand. Vary it by trying to hold the crush during the traffic update or the weather report on the radio.

Cheap and easy way to increase your grip strength, working on it twice a day, on the way to work and on the way home.

During the holster drawing class, we were trained to hold with the left hand more then the right so you don't imped the trigger finger by binding up the hand.

I must say it works and even keeping the right thumb looser so it does not disturb the grip. So, I vote for non-crush grip.

That was something that I was amazed by. It was my bicep/tricep that were getting tired, not the forearms. I hold on tight with both the crush grip and the push forward, pull back techniques.

Take some 2lb to 3lb dumb bells and hold one in each hand with your arms straight up from the shoulder thumbs pointing back. Bend elbows to 90 degrees and straighten. start with reps of 5 and work up to 10 reps of 20 with a minute between reps.
Hold dumb bells straight out and roll the thumbs down and tip the pinky finger upwards, same work up in reps.
Normal curls will help with biceps.
All of these exercises can be enhanced by increasing the weights.

Have fun

Thanks for the tip Selurcspi!

Yup, Selurcspi is our dumbbell expert. Read that as you will.