RayKu

If I can approach this question from a slightly different angle. Rather than focusing on the gun versus hands driving towards the target, I have found it useful to focus on my feet (specifically the balls of my feet) driving to the target. When I do this, what I am aware of is the position and tension in my wrists which is something that BE has described in other posts on the proper grip. Moving my focus to my feet has the benefit of maintaining proper balance especially the tendency in transitions to move weight back towards my heels or the natural tendency to rotate around the spine, and really helps maintain the index. When I focus on driving either my hands or the gun, I have a greater tendency to lose my index. In short I focus on what I drive with rather than what I am driving. Hope this helps.

I believe it is KG Kote's stainless steel. Finally, got a chance to take it to the range, and me likeee!

Just ordered mine from Pistol Gear, and yes, he is incredibly fast with delivery! I cannot wait to try them out.

Great idea. My club has a practice session once a week, but it is very informal. Some quick thoughts in no particular: 1) using basic drills like those in SA book or any of the other excellent IPSC shooting books would be a good start, but ideally I would want a league where these standards are just warm up as much of the value can be had through dry fire practice at home, 2) shooting from multilpe positions/boxes. Personally I do not have that much space at home unless I were to scare the living daylights out of my neighbors. 3) shooting around barricades (and other awkward positions), personally this is the weakest of my generally weak shooting skills, and I would love to practice it much more. Dry firing around doors and walls just doesn't cut it, 4) shooting on the move, enough said? 5) lastly, moving targets. MB's website has some great simulations, but it is just not the same. As one can probably gather, for me these aspects of IPSC shooting would be very valuable in a training league because they tend IMHO to provide more challenges with sight picture and recoil control. Oh yeah, anything that can train visual patience would be worth its weight in gold or brass.

Your's too. The grip's are EricW's that I purchased from Pistol Gear. I like them a lot. They give the XD the same feel in my hand as an SVI scott grip.

Absolutely! I installed the DP because of the fiber optics in the rear, but I definitely have some sight envy after I saw how well his bomars are fitted.

"One good thing about production that I'd never thought of is that the custom works is pretty limited. That means quick turnaround!!!!" Absolutely! Rich did the work in less than a week. "Needless to say I'm excited. I need to order a few thousand rounds of 9mm - thanking the good man upstairs that I'm not reloading a one of them." Amen and pass the ammo

Yup. 9mm production. We will see, but I think it may be almost as fast as my limited SV sight tracker.

Rich did such a great job, I had to share.

Just received my XD back from Rich at Canyon Creek. WOW. He did a fantastic job. I cannot wait to take it to the range. The trigger feels great; short and crisp like my SVs. And, the KG Kote job looks fantastic. Rich even took out a few gunsmithing marks a made of the slide taking out the darn rear sight.

Great advice all around. I recently bought an open gun from one of the members of my club, and I can already see the advantages of training with the dot sight. Calling shots, transitions, shooting on the move, trigger pull, everything that everyone has mentioned can be refined and diagnosed much more quickly following the bouncing dot. Mine is an apparantly reliable optima sight mounted on a 5 inch SV hybrid. This set up allows me to have the same NPA as my limited and production guns. Combined with dry firing drills the dot definitely helped me achieve my best placements of the year at this past weekend's local match (too bad its the end up here in Ohio) with a second place open 4th in limited.

Thanks guys that is what I thought. When the option only appears through the custom shop, I think it is a little weak to call something factory production though that should be clarified in the rules. It will be interesting to see however if manufacturers start to offer magwells more regularly. Frankly, if I were leo or military, I would much prefer a magwell in the event I had to do a mag change under fire.

I have been pouring through the threads looking for the answer to this questio to no avail. I am sure Merlin or someone else will find a thread in a second. Going through Springfield Custom Shops information made me wonder whether their "extreme funnel magwell" for the XD which I believe is picured in the XD catalog is legal for production. I know many people will say that at the very least it goes against the spirit of production, but this was what I was thinking. 1) the factory offers the magwell to the public, and 2) the xd is on the list so no production number is required. I have heard there was some issues with another manufacturer's production gun with magwell (at World Shoot?), but I never heard the final result. My 2 cents: if our sport is leading manufacturers to rethink pistol design and offer smarter, faster, production pistols than bravo everyone wins including production shooters. While we are at it, now that factory mags go to "eleven" or more, shouldn't the 10 round limit be changed?

Matt, Rick and Canyon Creek is just putting the finishing touches on my XD. While it will probably not be done by this weekends match let me know if you want to try it when it comes back.

I have very small hands (I actually wear a ladies small size golf glove), and I found the XD to be the best fit for the price. The pistol sets up much like a traditional 1911 with a much smaller grip, and as the previous posts have noted because it plastic (ooops, polymer), it is easy to reduce even further. Of course, a nice 1911 customed tailored to fit would be quite nice as well though usually much more expensive. I believe someone on this forum was offering a certificate for a new 9mm tactical for $400.

I am a newbie to IPSC and competitive pistol shooting as well. Started this Spring. If you are going to spend money on an "entry" level gun, I would recommend either a 9mm glock or xd tactical for production, and then try other pistols in other divisions. If you get hooked like I did, you will want to take your time and research what divisions interest you (ie iron sights versus optical, etc), and then buy the best you can afford in that division. Otherwise, if you already have a pistol, stick with that for a while and work on being safe and having fun, and then allow the green eyed monster to lead you to your next purchase. You can spend a lot of money very quickly so be smart. As for your poll, production XD 9mm (shoots great and inexpensive factory ammo), 9mm open (factory ammo will limit you to shooting minor pf), and 40 s&w for limited and the occaisional limited 10. As you will gather from the various threads throughout this forum, the goal is generally to maximize the number of rounds one can carry and minimizing perceived recoil.

Just purchased a used 9mm open gun from one of the guys in my club to add to my fast growing collection of pistols. 3 new pistols since starting IPSC in April (XD Tactical 9mm, SV Limited .40s&w, and now 9mm SV open hyrbid comp and Optima sight) My wife is fearful of next season when I might start shooting 3 gun I know this is probably a hopeless quest, and will probably be the straw that leads me to buying a dillon and start reloading. Anyway, I had to check in with the experts to see if such a thing exists; otherwise, its shooting minor until the dillon comes.

A little softer than a popping balloon.

Great job Doug, The match was a lot of fun, and excellent food recommendation. Can't wait to try the ribs.

Bought my 5" Infinity Expert from Renee at Speed Shooters, and have enjoyed it ever since. I made the same grip modifications to the airsoft as I hav on my limited and open SVs so the set up and feel are quite similar. I definitely would not practice reloads. Within the first week, I cracked the base pad and replaced it with a home modified dawsons. (As for reloads, get the blue safety mags for S_I. They work great, just watch your toes.) In addition to being just fun to shoot, it is useful for working on seeing the sights lift. If you have any tendency to flinching working with an airsoft pistol will help eliminate it. I would also add AirsoftAtlanta.com to the mix, and they sell a PHX hi-cap that looks to be pretty competitive with the Western Arms. While it may not be quite as good, it is at least half the price.

Hi Matt, Tried one in my Walther P99 before I traded for an XD. My impression was that it gave a more rolling recoil than a standard spring which I didn't like. I am not sure how it would feel in the XD, but I have to say that I currently love the XD with a 16# spring and Don's guide rod. Then again, I prefer a fast sharp recoil with less muzzle flip to a softer recoil with more flip.

Winchester 165gr. whitebox makes major out of my 5" SV. I actually prefer the UMC 180gr at .17/bullet, it feels softer than the whitebox. I usually buy the UMCs from either Natchez or CheaperThanDirt depending on who has the better price.

Like you JP I am new to IPSC shooting though unlike you I am also pretty darn new to shooting in general. Aside from shooting with my dad as a kid deer hunting and rare plinking with his pistol, I had not fired a gun or had any real serious training (except video games of course). I started out this Spring shooting a walther p99 and really enjoyed it at Crooked Creek my local club. As I started to really enjoy it, I became a frequent visitor of this forum, and found a great many useful posts. I was making some progress with that and BE book, but mostly I was just focusing on trying to stay safe. Then I bought Steve Anderson's book as a result of recommendations here and from one of my friends at CC. Boy what a difference. While I had dry fired a great deal, until I started following his drills, I had never really done it in the context of using a buzzer and set targets and distances, etc. Doing his drills has really helped me to focus on the sights after the buzzer goes off rather than having the brain shut off. I started out shooting in the 30% range at my local matches, and now just this past weekend at Area 5 shot 56% overall and in the 60's on several stages with Dave Sevigny as the standard! Steve's book has definitely contribued to that progress. Good stuff and good luck.

Area 5 gave me a LAMR screw up to share. I was shooting production and got the LAMR command, popped the mag in and holstered my XD. Buzzer sounds and I am off to the races. Of course, I get to the first target, and pull the trigger and nothing, not even a click as I forgot to chamber a round Must of cost me at least 2 seconds on a very short stage If that were not bad enough, I did it again later in the match.

My thanks and congratulations to the Area 5 organizers and staff as well. It was my first Area championship, and it was a great deal of fun even shooting production. With honey don't forget the keys, I dropped the mag as I went for the key, but had brain freeze when I looked down to put it into my pocket. Apparently too many pockets on my shorts Linemans was my favorite stage. I think for anyone not shooting open, it really presented a tough choice. I ran around for the same reason Glock24Man did. Fun fun fun. Next time, I will have to figure out a way to look for forum members. It would be great to meet many of you ftf.