RayKu

This is a great thread! I look forward to getting and reading mental coache's book as well as his threads. From the world outside of shooting or sports, the zone is part of what some describe as rapid cognition which is the ability of the mind to process information and execute without consious thought. While we, including myself as a newbie shooter, are all capable of this, the key to successful rapid cognition in any context is expertise. The reason for this is expertise reduces the amount of information that the conscious brain needs to process in order to achieve a desired result under stress or speed. The best shooters have their bodies finely tuned so they are not thinking about stance, grip, sight picture, or even how to get from one spot to another. After years of training, practice, and of course skill, the top shooters like our host are able to reduce all of the variables and information that the brain needs to process down to what they want to hit. As such while newbies can get into a zone, they are not as likely to perform as well because we still have too much going on in our heads even if we do not realize it. Under those circumstances zoning out is more appropriate because something important like seeing the sights actually gets missed in the process. For a really accessible take on this in other contexts with some really funny and sometimes shocking examples check out Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. He is a journalist (ie. easy to read) who put together a book covering the current state of scientific research on the subject.

Newguy, Thanks for the Dlask suggestion. I have dremmeld the svi trigger as fare as it will go so it is good to know about some alternatives. While do not have one of Jim's grips, I would second your recommendation. He does great work, and is a class guy. I just bought a pistol from a friend that has a standard S_I grip, and will be sending it to him. PS. EricW. Just put on your grip tape for my XD. Great stuff!

There is a reason TGO and BE recommend keeping the left hand as high as possible. It works much better even for smaller hands. Playing with the lowered weak hand grip during my local weekend match led to a couple of observations. First, a lowered weakhand did in fact make it a little easier to control verticle muzzle flip. However, any benefit in muzzle flip control was outweighed by a loss in accuracy. It was more difficult to return the sight to a proper horizontal alignment.

Thanks Eric. I am not LEO so I am not wedded to any pistol except financially.

Thanks everyone. Primarily I shoot an SVI 40 in limited and limited ten. I am in the process of trading my production gun a Walther P99 for an XD. The SVI has a scotts grip which I undercut and relieved portions of the front of the grip for a better feel for my strong hand. So Carlos, I am totally with you on the abrasive feel, and when I get the XD I will be using grip tape on that as well. Riki: I too have found that sliding my weak hand forward some more helps me to provide more neutral side to side pressure. Otherwise I had a tendency to push a little too much on the backstrap with my weak hand. Interestingly, after experimenting with a right side catch and different extended mag released, I found that I actually did not have a problem with the mag releaseas long as my strong hand was positioned properly. My problem is a short trigger finger which was a real problem with the first DA pull on the walther. On the SV I used a short insert whichI then dremmeled to provide as much relief as possible. Seems to work so far. Hopefully today, I will be able to try out both with MB's timing drill.

For someone with small hands, I have been wondering about the position of my weak hand. Is it better to have the weak hand as high up on the grip as possible with the strong hand which would leave some space between the grip and the magwell? Or, is it better to grip a little lower and touch the magwel so that both hands form a grip that provides more leverage during recoil? Thanks in advance!

I also wanted to congratulate Scott and all of those that made the AWARE match possible. It was my first match outside of the local club circuit, and it was a great experience. The people were friendly and helpful, the shooting was challenging but fun, and the weather could not be beat in August. I look forward to attending many more.

Do you have a picture of the modification? And, how is it holding up? Thanks!

Finally, found BE's post on spring bending for SV followers. It led me to check all my mag springs which have now been bent to the appropriate shape. On a couple the lower coil was bent in an odd manner which may have been contributing to the misfeeds. When I handfed rounds, there were no problems even if a lighter recoil spring (12# wolf) and one buf (Wilson) added into the setup. We will see how it shoots at the range, and after some more polishing of the feed ramp per BE's earlier posts on finicky .40's.

Thanks George. Its been a long time since I took Math 101.

Recently purchased some dry fire practice targets that are 1/4 the size of official IPSC targets. Now I am a math idiot so does anyone know how to approximate/estimate distance (ie. 1 foot = 3 yards, etc.) for targets of this size? Thanks in advance.

Help. I recently made the plunge and purchased an SVi Dot Tracker in .40 S&W for IPSC Limited. The pistol works great, but has occaisional feeding problems. Once in a while, the bullet appears to get lodged in the ramp. Following the advice in other threads, I have cleaned and polished the ramp, breachface, and magazines which are also new with new springs both SVI Mages, and Dawson Tuned. The guys in my club believe that the feeding problem is most likely caused by my factory ammo (Winchester, Wally World, White Box), and ammo length. When we fed a mag with longer loads, we had no problems. Then again, my mags run just fine at least 75% of the time. (And, yes, the problems appears to occur regardless of which magazine I am using). Aside from investing in a Dillon which I cannot afford right now: 1) are there any ways to tune the gun to consistently run factory length ammo if that is the problem (stronger or weaker recoil spring, different extractor, magazine springs, etc.)? or 2) are there affordable factory loads in longer lenths? Thanks in advance!

Hi all. Just started pistol/ipsc shooting early this spring, and I am now thoroughly addicted to the sport. I wanted to simply post a thank you to the various members of this forum, and, of course, to the host. I have learned a tremendous amount from shooting technique to equipment from the posts here. Kudos! This is a great place! I look forward to meeting the people behind the avatars as I expand beyond local matches.