Paladin

good move Kevin!!

I find that they recoil kinda funny and unpredictable...

BEWARE TRAP AHEAD!! I fell into this trap sometime ago and began to calc. stage hit factors and using it to determiine my shooting speed.. now I am a weeeee bit wiser.. and I have found out that determining the target challenge tells you the required sight picture and hence the focus type to use.. if you are good at this and you are not wasting time getting on or off the target then your 'speed' will be there..

you have to place your trust somewhere else for the open gun..in this case you have to trust the dot on your scoring surface and let it happen..bang!!

Thanks for kicking up back this one..... I am currently working on strengthening my sight picture as I think I overemphasize sight alignment and as a result I am not the best at putting the gun at the best spot on the target it needs to be especially in transitions... I recently discovered in my research that when the human eye sees a featureless object it is difficult for it to focus and so may wander over the object.. I also found that the human eye first has to acquire the boundaries of an object to see/identify it.. hence you will acquire brown easily but, esp. at longer distances where the zones are not easily visible, you might break a shot on the C zone since you did not give yourself time to find a focus spot.. I know many of us aim for 'middle' but what if the target is partial or has an unusual shape, how do you find middle?? if I am shooting low in the squad and the GMs shot before (smile), then the A zone usually has a bunch of tapes in it, so I aim for that at speed.. Okay, first challenge: Creating a spot to focus on the target.. What I tried was to superimpose a ghostlike image of a X on the target. The ends of the X spans the boundaries of the target so immediately I have an aiming reference 'the intersection of the lines or the middle of the X. This intersection happens to land in the A zone. .. (not sure if I explain this correctly it is kinda like the + shown earlier.. for odd shape targets I take the piece of X thats visible e.g. a > if their is a no-shoot on the left of the target (my right).. I have been trying this and it has been helping me tremendously with improving my precision.. I am hoping with sufficient practice my eyes will easily acquire the spot I want to shoot and all of the above will be regulate to the backoffice or as we say in Operations, LOOP (lights out order processing). let me know what you think...

I go with the flip as I find it a more versatile reload - speed, tactical etc. I also find that by just bending at the elbow everything happens right..gun is angled for mag to slide out faster and at an angle away from my body, able to see into the mag well etc.. I find that by having the intention to reload, and hitting the mag release right after the shot call whilst simultaneously going for the spare mag everything just kinda happens right!!

john shaw did a video sometime ago.. it is a filming of a seminar and so a bit short but has some very useful info...

..gives me a migraine.. definitely not for taking if going to shoot..

another way to look at it is optimal performance set (Plaxco) where you have the right balance of relaxation and motivation..

..I am going to print this topic..suspect I may have to go over everyones' post a couple thousand times..

Got this from Rob's Forum.. <Mod, if inappropriate please delete..> Rob's putting a different spin on this..or is he?? Question: OK, you always talk about trigger pull... I am a good shot compared with most officers in the area, when I take my time! As soon as I speed up, I'm all over the target. Any suggestions? Rob's Answer: This is the most common problem associated with fast shooting and one that will never be mastered completely. The problem comes from simultaneously performing two tasks that should be done one before the other. In a nut shell, here is how it goes ... or should go ... You pull the trigger far enough to cause the ignition process of the gun to be initiated. When the gun fires, it moves rearward as a reaction to the bullet being propelled forward. Your resistance to the gun's movement, because it is not on the centerline of force caused by the slide's resistance to movement and the line of the bore, causes the gun to rotate upwards. To quickly fire the next shot, you first must return the gun to alignment with the target. As gravity works too slowly and is of insufficient strength to cause this to happen fast enough, you must "pull" or "push" the gun back down. What actually keys this is another lesson. When the gun is again aligned, you start the whole sequence again. The problem happens when you compress the returning of the gun into the firing of the gun. If the bullet has not yet left the barrel when you push, the shot can go anywhere. If you pull the trigger and push or pull to control recoil at the same time, the shot can go anywhere. Generally these shots are low and right for a right-handed shooter. Jerking the trigger is really not the problem, as long as the accuracy requirement can be met with a sudden trigger pull action. On most close shots on big targets this is O.K. What has to be done is completely separating the returning of the gun to alignment from the firing of the gun. It is that simple, but not easy. To shoot really fast, you develop very quick reactions and timed actions to combat flip. It takes many thousands of rounds to even begin to get this programmed to happen automatically. Now the problem is identified. To overcome a problem in this area requires you to develop timing, causing a series of events to occur initiated by a single incident, in this case the pulling of the trigger. This is where your training and practice comes in. If you are practicing the right things and fixing the problems, you will see improvement. I feel this issue significant enough that its study is the basis for my general shooting skills development. Quit worrying about jerking the trigger and focusing on the front sight. That will not help you beat this problem by itself. You have to reprogram your computer. Good luck! Rob

Range feedback.. Okay went to the range on Sunday and setup the speed shoot stage. 1st run: Here I locked on the first target and then use index to sweep the other targets.. Actually felt uncomfortable as I felt that visual input was not the best..shot the stage dropping 2 points. 2nd/3rd run: Using a hard target focus and sight look through I called the shot at the top of the sight lift and started to move then..Then I noticed something strange..after about the 6th target you start to get a throw-off in where the gun is pointed at the target, it is almost like the errors in sight alignment are adding up until it reaches this level where the error is now material to really throw you off.. I dropped a point but corrected this error for the next target.. Repeated and noted the same thing only now because I am more conscious of it, I started to check sight alignment so I ran it slower.. Brian, can you comment/recall the error magnification happening to you or others?? 4th run: Using a hard target focus and sight look through I called the shot when the sight is on its way back down.. this gave me a little extra time to get the feedback and I felt more confident when moving to the next target.. Quoting Flex "Any time lost reading the sights is likely gained back by allowing your body to move on..." . For this one I dropped no points.. The index gave the fastest time this gave the highest hit factor. Okay I will have to experiment some more. I see this as especially important given the increase in blaze stages in matches..My learning from this is that VISUAL TIMING is a critical factor in blazing and staying in control..because you can still see all you need to see but at what stage of the cycle you are picking this up is important.. Also because intermediate targets and the focus type used you tend to feel almost like the gun is shooting itself but for the blaze stage, your attention has to be peaked (guess it can be likened to driving at 50mph vs. 100 mph.) For my speed shoot training I am going to increase the number of targets I shoot from an average of 6 to 14 on some of the practice runs. This is to develop greater stamina on the visual timing control.. thanks all..

This stage began with running from one box to another box from where we engaged the targets. My visual focus plan was a hard target focus but looking through the sights.. I am figuring that mike occured because at that point my visual focus got out of whack and I may have been changing focus from target to sight or vice versa.. also because I didn't take the time to refine my index on entering the box I did not have the index as a backup... In retrospect I am thinking that rather than worry about speeding up that shot call (to recover from a miss) I should speed up my index setup..kinda like how TJ does it..and not have a miss for the blaze stage..

Agree.. this one was a club match however..as long as not getting to the unsafe zone, will push..

EricW: did I see right, the Beretta grip felt smallest??? also how did you find the G19 grip..it hurts my hand because the hump really pushes against the bottom of my hand..the hump on the g26 rights in the middle of my palm and the hump on the g17 is lower so it doesnt push on the bottom of my hand so much..

shoot a Beretta too.. I just roll that trigger, I never prep it..EL's article is good though..

the shot was called...but by that time the eye/gun is on its way to the next target.. their is a lag between see sights lift (pure observation) and call the shot (feedback to you). Yes, I can always slow down but you push the envelope sometime to take yourself to the next level..I will run some stages this coming weekend using a number of visual variations (or focus type) and see what happens.. thanks..

Hi All: Shot a club match yesterday and on a speed stage had a mike. Thing is, I saw the mike on my shot call but by that time I was already on the next target.. I did not make up the shot as the speed stage had 12 targets close together and I did not remember the specific target and didn't want to go searching. Later I thought to myself if their is a better way to call your shots on such close targets or if I shouldn't be 'calling shots' at all, but relying more on my index for such stages.. Inputs???

Triple Bill Drill: Set up 3 targets at 7yds. and shoot a bill drill on each. Run the targets in sequence with only a slight break in between. For this drill it is extremely important that you forget about results as this will lead to tension which can mask the technical problem or induce other technical problems, let the process work!! 1st target: perfect visual control- get your classic sight picture on each shot, call your shots and followthrough.. do not read the target results.. yet. 2nd target: classic sight picture on first shot and just blaze after that. do not read the target results..yet. 3rd target: classic sight picture on first shot, for the other shots as soon as the sights drop into the notch break the shot, no adjustments, or cleaning up of the sight picture.. Now score your targets and let the shooting tell you its story..look at the pattern of shots, recall how you felt whilst shooting on each target and what you noticed, or did not notice.. This will tell you what you need working on right now, you fix that, run through this drill a couple more times, and then start to move back the target to 10yds, 15 yds, 20 yds, 25 yds. Pretty soon you can place 2 shots on target on demand irrespective of challenge..you then build it up to 2 targets, 3 targets etc...

not sure I agree with some part of the articles (given the work I have done with Cerebral Palsy/Spasticity) esp. about losing synapses and 90% of these being formed by age 3.. would suggest you research some more or not go along there.. wont say more on it here as this is not the forum for that.. good effort though to take a different perspective on learning the sport..

..Miseducation: Having the wrong concepts of what it takes to shoot well..

Brian has 3 rules of shooting: I think it is locate the target, bring gun on target and keep gun on target until bullet has left target..this doesn't change much.. if you want to reduce time wasting (what many people term 'going faster') you have to know what the target will allow you to get away with (acceptability) so that you are not there overaiming and you also need to reduce lags in your shooting e.g. getting a third sight picture on the target before you transition..what for?? call the shot from the 2nd sight picture and move- really move.. I think too many of us see shooting faster as working that trigger faster, this is only so in about 5-10% of target challenges you will face..therefore the first critical step is to debunk your mind of that concept.. ..why worry about going slower when you haven't started going fast???

you are good when you can place a shot on target whenever you want to, wherever you want to, however you want to.. Dry fire is good for developing coordination, awareness and subconscious interplay.. it is the preparation.. Live fire is good as a reality check.. it is the exam some prefer taking exams until they pass, others (like myself) prefer preparing and then taking the exam and passing first time out..

Sorry, just saw the other thread with directions!!

Hi Tim: which int'l airport are you closest to..and directions from..thanks!