Jake Di Vita

I had issues with going first on stages once upon a time. One year at every local match I shot, I talked with the squad and arranged the order so that I went first on every single stage for every match. They were always more than happy since it meant none of them had to go first that day. That pretty much eliminated any mental issues I had with going first. The biggest issues are occasionally with movers or timing things you haven't yet seen. There's not much of a cure to that besides experience and doing your due diligence with gathering as much information about the stage as possible prior to your slotted shooting time. As always, the key is to focus on the fundamentals. Find target, aim at target, hit target, repeat. Having your plan set and burned in when your squad walks up to the stage is a huge benefit.

It's good that you're doing something and that it's helping, however I've always felt romwod was a very poor substitute for mobilitywod.

I always include penalties. No real sense in using the number without penalties since it isn't representative of the real score.

He and I talked in PMs after I made that post. He did do very well, however he did also only shoot 88% of the points at the match he was referring to. I'm guessing the match you're referring to is the Hawktech Arms low cap match? If so, he shot 87% of the points at that match as well. Again, it worked out well for him and he had a strong finish. I still think if you're shooting matches with a strategy that yields significantly fewer than 90% of the possible points, you are playing with fire. So while shooting an iron sight division like you would shoot open can work out depending on the match, it's probably not the best strategy over the long haul for most people. It seems like he should agree with me since his last post in the 2nd page of this thread read, "If you aren't shooting 93+% of the points regardless of division you are doing it wrong."

Right now I'm using my old world shoot model cr speed race holster but I used the same strategy for the surrender draw when I shot production with a regular bladetech too.

Yes you can still shoot pretty well with a less than ideal grip. Pretty well is not at all interesting to me. I want to be competitive with the best in the country. A less than ideal grip is not conducive to that goal. If you're satisfied with performance that is just ok you can get away with all sorts of sloppy technique. So you don't even shoot USPSA?

What actual testing did you do to put your hypothesis through the crucible that led you to figure you used? You might only be losing .02 - .05 on a 7 yard open target, but as the targets get more difficult the cost of a poor grip in both time and points increases dramatically. But hey, I'm not here to convince you of anything. If that's what you want to believe, go for it. Well sure, SOMEONE might experience that. Someone might experience mental problems because they have a hang nail too. What's your point? I've never heard any good shooter complain that missing a perfect grip on his draw scrambled his brains. If you want to start breaking down every aspect of USPSA that could potentially adversely effect less skilled shooters mentally we are going to be here for awhile because the list is practically infinite. Maybe my English is off but I'm pretty sure saying "it isn't all it's cracked up to be" and "it's not the end all be all that's been insinuated" both seem like shapes and forms of saying a good grip isn't that important. You're saying the grip is foundational and allows you to access a higher level but at the same time it's not all it's cracked up to be. These statements are more than a little contradictory. What class are you?

That's quite a tortured thought process you have to come to those conclusions based on shooters elbow. A perfect grip is all it's cracked up to be. I have never been mentally screwed up because I didn't hit a perfect draw. "Being relaxed" is so overused it's become a cliche. I don't even know what flowing with the gun means. Your grip is the only interface your body actually has with the gun....it boggles my mind how one can reason their way to thinking it's not that important.

It's funny because I feel like 90% of my posts are harping about grip, stance, or other fundamental concepts.

Couple thoughts. At 7 yards on a full target the draw really needs to be under a second. First, your hands need to be moving way faster and both should start moving at the same time. Try to focus on slapping the strong side of your belly with your support hand as fast as possible at the start of the beep. If you focus on snapping the support hand as fast as possible...like whipping a wet towel....the strong hand will naturally move faster as well. The support hand will also be closer to the gun allowing you to get both hands on the gun at the earliest moment possible in the draw stroke. That alone will probably save you .15 or more. Also at 7 yards the shot really needs to be breaking at the moment you hit extension. You touched on this a bit. The way to achieve this is you need to be getting on the sights while you are extending the gun. This again as you said is another solid .20. For being pushed back you said your center of gravity needs to be in front of your knees. You have the right idea, but what we are actually looking for is your center of gravity to be forward of the middle of your foot. Hinging your hip with a couple more degrees of flexion should do the trick here. You aren't being pushed a lot so a small change is likely to be all that's needed.

Link? I'd like to look at the stats and see what there is to see. Obviously shooting fast with good points is good. If you want to keep this as mind numbingly simple as humanly possible as if we were explaining it to a 4 year old that's fine I guess. In reality I'm going to make different decisions on how I shoot a stage if I'm shooting minor rather than major. One easy example of this is I'll shoot far more targets on the move shooting major.

The percentage of points you should be shooting is going to depend on the match. If we're being specific, the goal isn't as many alphas as possible as quickly as possible....the goal is the highest points per second. Strategies for achieving the highest points per second are absolutely going to vary between people shooting minor and major. It does matter what division you shoot. Go ahead and shoot a match in production like you would in open and tell me how that works out for you.

No it doesn't. What? I'd love an explanation to that statement.

I have some video as well. Great match as always.

In an ideal world you'd use full size targets at full distance. Compromise however you need to. I've dryfired at more light switches and outlets than I could possibly count.

It sounds like what's happening is when you shoot shotgun and rifle the platform is much more forgiving than handgun. You are probably not calling your shots as much with rifle and shotgun as you are aiming and generally hit what you aim at with those guns. Mistakes are generally punished much harsher with handguns. So now what you are aiming at with a handgun you are slightly missing and thus become aware that you aren't calling your shots. That's just my guess though, I obviously don't know you so it's not really fair for me to say but it seems to make sense. I feel like it's hard to teach because it's something you have to experience. What I'd recommend doing is to first make sure you aren't blinking and your gun is sighted in correctly. Then, go put a paper target at 30 yards, shoot it, mark where you think the dot was the instant the gun fired with a paster on a fresh target next to you. Then go downrange and compare. Repeat this until you can reliably do it and produce targets that mirror each other. Then increase the difficulty. Do 2 shots. Then 6 shots, or 2 reload 2, and so on.

Considering that your chosen handle is DClass, you just need to set up a daily practice regimen and stick to it. If you are actually a D class shooter, you don't need to be asking questions right now. You need to put the work in and have a gun in your hand every single day.

Calling the shot is knowing where the bullet will impact at the instant that it has left the barrel. If you can't call hits on steel plates without waiting for them to fall then you aren't calling your shots at all. This isn't really something you learn, it is something you see. All the required information is right there in front of your eyes, it's up to you to recognize it.

Yoga is good, although I think the praises of it can be a bit over the top. I attack my flexibility problems through strength and conditioning and mobility wod. It's a subscription service and the information is more than worth it. It is impossible for me to overstate the value. If you can get into all the bio mechanically ideal positions of a comprehensive strength and conditioning program, you will have normal full range of motion. Those positions are mostly covered by the 7 archetypes that Kelly talks about.

You also would probably be better served by a generally wider foot position. That will also make it easier to get a bit lower in the stance.

Don't expect a recent change to immediately be better than what you have been doing. When it comes to athletics being uncomfortable is usually a good indicator that you're on the right path. Let's put the work in every day and re-evaluate in 3 months.

Agreed. Specifically I found that keeping the weak arm elbow tight to the side of my body at mag insertion greatly increased my consistency when I shot production, which puts the gun right around chest height. I used to reload very high in front of my face in open but I've found the gun to be migrating downwards over the years. It's a balancing act between the more consistent arm position of the chest high gun position and the better view angle of the face high gun position.

I don't have a problem at all with the idea of working on splits, but I do think the way he has outlined to do it is unnecessary, overly complicated, and not of much use to the rest of his game. I get the idea of low hanging fruit and diminishing returns, but I'm a big believer that all things must be worked on all the time. I think he can achieve what he is after through accentuating trigger pull speed in dry fire rather than going through an index finger strength and conditioning program (lol). Operating the trigger in dry fire at the speeds we're talking that would improve overall trigger speed also brings along the added training stimulus for the grip of less than perfect trigger manipulation which is something that is likely to happen on match day as I've heard you and the boys talk about a few times. It provides a good and consistent opportunity to develop the grip to keep the gun on target even when you are pulling the trigger at a speed where the line is force is not straight back to the rear of the gun and as you suggested, vision is still totally in play. This seems to me like a more reasonable course of action unlike the plan he hatched to increase index finger fast twitch muscle fiber density. Another benefit of this is that it checks the box that says practice must happen at an intensity which exceeds anything you could possibly need or see on match day.

I agree that his feet are crazy, he should be lower, and should tend towards both feet wholly on the ground. I feel like transitions come more from the hips. Obviously the legs are involved but I don't think that general position "completely ruins" your ability to transition. The wider the transition the more it becomes a problem. I wouldn't want to be doing a 150 degree transition on one stiff leg but side by side target transitions really shouldn't be effected much at all. As far as your last sentence, I spent about 5 seconds looking and found Max doing "tippy toe" stuff a bunch on one stage just fine. I don't think it would be very hard to find more examples. If you can train to be stable in that position and have an exit strategy to efficiently leave, I have no problem with using a stance like that in the correct circumstances. Again, I agree with your original assessment and prescription, I just think saying no top shooter does it is going too far.

Woof. No for the same reason that I don't use a typewriter lol. Open is the one true division. Revo is for hipsters and WW1 vets.