Cross Eye Dominance

[nreno88]

Long time lurker first time poster.

First, I know, another thread on eye dominance and I did use the search function there is a pretty good pile of other threads. I just feel that my situation might be a little different enough to warrant its own thread.

On to the meat and potatoes to see if I am out to lunch in my thought process.

I am considering getting into PRS or PRS rimfire depending on how much patience my wife and 2 year old have.

A little about me, I am right handed, left eye dominant red blooded American. All my life from boy scouts to my mid 30's I have shot rifles and shotguns left handed and at work I qualify left handed. All of this has been done with right handed rifles being shot left-handed. Can I shoot a rifle right handed, short answer is yes but it feels incredibly awkward and disjointed. I am pretty huge on doing the same thing all the time. I don't want to have to think this is a shotgun left hand, this is a semi auto left hand, this is a bolt gun under time what do I do with my hands.

I think the path of least resistance would be to learn to run a bolt with my left hand on a left handed rifle. The only downside would be limited options for equipment.

For rimfire I would be looking at a LH B-14R, or T1X MTR. Vudoo is available in left as well but price is a bit out of my league.
For centerfire a LH b-14HMR, T3X, or GAP PPR.

For those of you who have made this decision, which path did you choose and how did it ultimately work out for you?
Thanks for your time and thoughtful responses.

 

[Tritiumdials]

Suck it up and use your right eye until it becomes operationally dominant. Support side stages will be a breeze for you. Best practices are to avoid fully closing your unused eye when it comes to optics, it reduces fatigue and you have the upper advantage of aiding in identifying other targets in your area of responsibility.

 

[Averageman]

I must have seen hundreds of these same threads in my life time, and i tell them the same thing.
Do what feels natural to you.

 

[acudaowner]

corrective surgery or a bat to the head , I joke there should be a way for you to either work through that problem or maybe around it blinders of some sort like silhouette shooters have that block one eye off I had a right eye dominance and used the brach string thing to retrain my eyes so I could shoot with both eyes open

and while not perfect it sure helped a lot I can now see mostly un blurry while looking down the iron sights of my handguns without undo strain on my eyes they also get tired a lot slower than they did before . Best of luck to you what ever you do

 

[6.5SH]

Older you are the harder it is to switch. That being said you are not handicapping yourself with the left handed Tikka T1x or T3

 

[siscoe308]

Ppl who say tough it out are stupid.

If you shoot lefty, get left handed guns. It will help with nearly all positional shooting. The controls will be more nature for you.

 

[KnowNothing256]

Archery coaches will tell you the same thing: shoot to your dominant eye.

Sounds like you've already done the hard work to get there, good on ya. Stick with it. I don't see any issues with any of the options you've listed for rimfire or centerfire, go for it, whichever makes you happiest. Also, it seems to me Left Hand Sales on here tend to be at a discount over the right-handed stuff, I guess because it's harder to move; keep an eye on the PX and you can score some goodies cheaper than us normies.

 

[RichMangus]

You can make the adjustment to left handed rifles. I switched hands on pistols and it took just a few weeks of practice.

If you want to shoot matches it is all about being smooth. Smooth is fast and fast is smooth.

 

[KnowNothing256]

Oh, and I failed to notice you were talking about getting a B14 HMR. I’d advise against it and steer you towards a Tikka instead; the B14 is actually a really good action with a few upgrades, but the semi-proprietary coned breech/bolt make it hard to get new/different barrels. If you aren’t ever gonna shoot it out that’s one thing, although I’ll say swapping the factory barrel on mine for a Hart very noticeably improved accuracy, especially after the first few shots.

Some of their barrels could be better and it’s a pain to go custom, so I say skip it.

 

[Superjet]

Shoot left handed. I've been cross dominant (sounds like a woke term) my whole life and think it is an advantage when shooting. I get to support the rifle/bow with my stronger arm.

 

[Gleedus]

I'm a left handed right eyed guy. I shoot right hand. But have trained myself to shoot right or left with both eyes open and no problem.
A friend of mine is a right hand left eye. He was unable to train to use his right eye so shoots left.
My wife is right hand left eye and shoots right no issue.

There is no right or wrong here. You probably can train either eye to work but its not always.

 

[UKDslayer]

I am left eye dominant right handed; shooting right-handed rifles (except carbine - have a Stag). You can adjust triggers easier than fixing eye dominance if necessary. It also gives you finer control of your rear bag. The added bonus - you can run the bolt much faster (esp.movers).

 

[Rob01]

Never understood the whole fixation on eye dominence. I am left eye dominant and shoot right handed and have no issues at all. You just need to know what you are working with. Everything I own is right handed and I have been shooting the sport 19 years without issue in many types of matches from many different obstacles and supports. If you arecomfortable right handed just shoot right handed. You will screw yourself over more trying to go lefty for some reason. Your eye dominance will be the last thing to hold you back in matches so get a rifle and go practice and shoot.

 

[nreno88]

Alrighty, so after a few months of shooting a left handed .22 trainer. I’m absolutely hooked on left handed rifles. I’ll be looking to slowly shift over to lefthanded rifles in the future, my poor wallet. Hopefully knowing how it worked out for me will get a few more cross eye dominant shooters to try left handed rifles. Until then I’ll be cruising the left handed section

 

[Dead Eye Dick]

My wife Brenda is left eye dominate. She put in the practice and became an International Class shooter using her right eye. Block out the left, and practice.

Our son is a true left handed person. You cannot believe all the issues he has getting/obtaining/building left handed firearms.

Learn to use the right. Especially if the rest of the family is right handed/right eye dominate.

A point to consider, if you keep on shooting left handed and everyone else in the family is right handed, when You want to leave yoru firearm collection to your child(ren) the firearms will be worthless except as wall hangers if yoru children are right handed. Its a situation I have right now.

 

[mikeshaw2]

Call me strange, but I shoot pistols and shotguns left eyed, but rifles right eyed

M

 

[Baron23]

Never understood the whole fixation on eye dominence. I am left eye dominant and shoot right handed and have no issues at all. You just need to know what you are working with. Everything I own is right handed and I have been shooting the sport 19 years without issue in many types of matches from many different obstacles and supports. If you arecomfortable right handed just shoot right handed. You will screw yourself over more trying to go lefty for some reason. Your eye dominance will be the last thing to hold you back in matches so get a rifle and go practice and shoot.

Rob - I'm right eye dominant by all kinds of tests...nonetheless my eye dominance is almost equal and will switch on me depending on what grabs which eye's attention.

In the past, I have tried to shoot two eyes open behind the scope as advised by many (incl Frank), and would often I will suddenly see the parallax adjustment knob overlayed on the reticle. And no, I can't shoot that way.

I fairly recently had cataract surgery on my right eye (dominant side) that dramatically improved my vision in that eye (back to 20/20). So, I can NOW far more easily shoot two eyes open behind the scope but will still, on occasion, see my parallax knob over the target picture. Now...with improved right eye vision (bit better than left eye)....a small squint of my left eye will shove my dominance back to my right eye.

IMO, eye dominance can be a significant issue if you want to shoot two eyes open. One eye open behind the scope only, no problem it seems.

I was an American Skeet competitor for a very long time (yeah, I'm getting old). In that sport, two eyes open is a significant advantage but I can't do that as my proper (as in hit the target) sight picture will change during the event....in particular, I will begin to cross fire and shoot well ahead of low house targets with the same sight picture that was working before the switch.

In skeet, the preferred solution is a small occluder (patch) on the off eye such that when in your stance with the gun mounted, it will block vision of the barrel by the left eye. But, this is still far inferior vision compared to two eyes wide open and if behind the scope for any length of time I believe eye strain will also result using this approach.

So, to me....eye dominance is actually a fairly significant issue and not to be too easily dismissed. But, I don't compete in rifles so I'm sure there may be something I'm overlooking.

 

[Rob01]

Yup I see no reason to shoot with both eyes open. We aren’t in the military or clearinghouses and worrying about peripheral threats. Even when I shoot with my dominant left eye I close my right. I get some people can’t physically do it but they are the minority.

 

[hildy99]

I shoot right handed and am left eye dominant. Wouldn't make sense to me to switch over to left handed rifles just because of my eye dominance. If your used to to shooting left handed just keep doing that (if shooting right feels awkward just you should really just get a left handed rifle). I don't feel like my cross eye dominance has ever hurt my shooting ability. I'm 30 and been shooting my whole life this way.

I've been shooting a tikka t1x for about a year and really like it.

 

[Sheldon N]

I prefer to shoot with both eyes open as it feels a bit more relaxed. For me, mentally focusing on the image in the scope and reticle all but makes the image from the non-shooting eye disappear. However, I can still glance up and check bubble level with left eye if needed.

I also learned to shoot weak side/non-dominant eye that way too. Started out having to close my right dominant eye to be able to see the image through the scope, however after some practice it got to where I didn't need to close the eye anymore, just focus on the scope/reticle with my left eye.