d_striker

[d_striker]

I never thought about starting one of these but after reading some other member's logs and learning from them, I decided that it may help me improve my new addiction by documenting my progress/failures. Also, I travel a lot for work which means I spend a lot of time in airports looking for ways to kill time.

I feel I should preface this log by saying I post on forums using my iPhone most of the time because I'm too lazy to fire up my laptop. So if what I type doesn't make sense or is misspelled, that is the reason. Especially if I type shit instead of shot.

I grew up in the midwest around guns from an early age. After leaving home for school in 1998, i didn't touch a gun for eight years. I bought a pistol in 2006 and started punching paper again. I thought I was a pretty good shot until I started shooting steel challenge and underwent a humbling reality check.

As mentioned above, my first introduction to competitive shooting was shooting steel challenge a few years ago, making it to about 4 matches a year. While I haven't been able to shoot as much as I would like, I felt that I improved with every match due to receiving tips from Hoser and a lot of other great local shooters.

I shot my first uspsa match down in Pueblo and was instantly hooked. Just what I need...another addiction to spend money on. I've shot two matches so far and am on my way to getting classified. I'm thinking I'll be classified as a C shooter in Limited. My rig is an XDm 40 and have slowly started accumulating accessories for it and customizing it.

Things I learned from my first match:

1.) Shooting Limited Minor sucks if you can't hit A's fast.

2.) Time is important...This isn't Bullseye shooting.

3.) I need to work on calling my shots.

4.) Planning how I'm going to shoot a stage does not mean I will shoot it that way once the timer goes off.

Things I learned from my second match:

1.) Planning how I'm going to shoot a stage does not mean I will shoot it that way once the timer goes off.

2.) There's value in figuring out the point factor of a stage and planning strategy accordingly.

3.) I need to work on calling my shots.

4.) Having a fast run is meaningless with Mikes and no shoots.

Edited September 29, 2010 by d_striker

[d_striker]

I shot my third USPSA match today. I did a lot of work to my XDm 40. I installed an oversized, extended mag release, Dawson fiber optic front sight, and the new PRP Ultimate Match trigger kit. I have an older PRP trigger kit in my XDm 9 and the new kit is greatly improved. I also got two Arredondo extended basepads (19+1) to go with two CR Speed mag pouches. I'm slowly accumulating my IPSC gear.

I test fired my gun yesterday to function test the trigger job. I didn't remove enough from the overtravel stop and was getting light primer strikes 100% of the time. On the XD platform, if you don't remove enough material from the over travel stop, it will prevent the safety lever from pivoting far enough upward to disengage the striker safety which is what causes the light primer strikes. I took it apart and filed down the overtravel stop while trying not to remove too much. It seemed to function fine at the range.

Stage 4-

I started on Stage 4 down at Pueblo today and I had a light primer strike on my draw. I had another after reloading a mag. I didn't execute my plan and dropped my mag before I was supposed to. I really need to get another CR Speed mag pouch. Only having two magazines on me for this stage, I was forced to pick my mag up off the ground in order to engage my last two targets. I wasn't even sure if I was allowed to pick them up and asked David who was RO'ing.

After shooting, I took my gun apart in the safety area and quickly filed down some more off the over travel stop and put it back together.

Stage 5-

This was the classifier that I blew. Gun ran fine w/o any light primer strikes.

Stage 6-no video

I loaded one into the pipe and inserted my mag with Arredondo base pad. After my very first shot off the draw, my mag fell out of my gun (you can see the same thing happening in the video on Stage 1.) After reloading on the second portion of the stage, another magazine dropped out after the first shot. I know that my magazine was inserted all the way as I pulled down on it hard after seating it. At first I thought that my support hand was hitting my new oversized mag release.

Stage 1-

Again, I loaded one in the pipe and inserted my mag. First shot off the draw and my gun spit my mag. Reloaded from my belt and recovered. I was getting a little frustrated at this point having equipment problems on every stage so far. I knew my grip was good on the draw on this run and knew that my support hand was nowhere near the mag release. This led me to believe that the gun doesn't want to hold a mag with 19 rounds in it. I was right as I downloaded for the last two stages (Stage 2 & 3) and my gun ran fine.

Stage 2-

I finally had a clean run with zero equipment issues. This run felt good. I even called my shot well enough to spot two misses and make them up.

Stage 3-No Video

I had a decent run with zero equipment issues. I had one mike on the swinger. Overall, it felt good not battling my equipment. I didn't get video on this stage either.

Results: Results Link

Things I learned:

1.) Equipment issues are frustrating to say the least.

2.) I need another mag pouch and extended magazine. Now I know why I see Limited shooters having 4 mag pouches on their belt...You never know what's going to happen. It sucks having to pick up mags off the ground.

Edited October 11, 2010 by d_striker

[JxMAN25]

thanks for sharing. have you got your equipment figured out yet?

[d_striker]

thanks for sharing. have you got your equipment figured out yet?

Yeah, it only took 3 wasted stages to figure it out.

If only I had a range in my backyard to test loads, gear, etc before matches...

[d_striker]

I'm leaving for CA early tomorrow morning which means I don't get to shoot any matches over the weekend. Since it'll be awhile before I get to shoot, I cut out of work early to get a practice session in. This is the first time I've ever went to the range with a practice plan.

I worked on my draw for about 30 rounds to reinforce all of the dry fire/drawing practice at home. Then I set up three targets and worked on transitioning. First I did the transition drill that BE outlined. Target 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3 for a total of 9 shots per string. I shot about 5 strings of this. Then I fired two shots at each target while transitioning.

Since I already had 3 targets set up, I spent a good bit of time shooting El Presidente. Then I worked on shooting while moving left to right, right to left, and walking forward.

At the beginning of the session, my hit pattern looked like Alpha-Mike, Charlie-Charlie, and Charlie-Delta. I was going too fast and wasn't making myself focus on the front sight. At the end of the session, while making a deliberate effort to watch the front sight, my hits were looking more like 2 Alpha and Alpha-Charlie. Unfortunately, the Surefire shot timer app doesn't work on my Iphone 4 like it did on my old Iphone so I couldn't time any my strings.

I also figured out why my XDm was spitting mags as shown in the video on Stage 1 above. My initial suspicion was correct...My support hand is in fact putting slight pressure on my new extended, oversized Canyon Creek mag release. Through recoil, my hand is applying enough pressure to sometimes depress the release.

Edited October 16, 2010 by d_striker

[d_striker]

Well, the equipment battle rages on.

First stage of the Clear Creek Match and I was having light strikes about 45% of the time. This meant racking the slide on almost every other shot. I thought this problem was resolved as the gun ran fine for the remainder of the Pueblo match, a 300 round practice session, and when I chronoed some loads (50 rounds) on Saturday. The Clear Creek match was pretty cold (40's) and I'm wondering if this had anything to do with it.

The issue is still the striker safety preventing the striker from traveling its full distance.

Cha-Lee helped me out with my gun and I now realize that I can run it without the striker safety, thus completely solving the problem instead of trying to treat the symptom, ie-removing more material from the over travel stop. Cha-Lee informed me that you have to tune the striker safety when messing with overtravel on the XD's. I didn't realize this as I never had the issue on my XDm 9 that I installed an older PRP trigger kit in. Instead of lowering one "shelf" on the striker safety, I'm just going to remove it all together.

It's a shame that I already removed so much from the over travel stop. Instead of buying a new PRP trigger, I installed a set screw on the back of the over travel stop to make up for all of the material that I already removed trying to resolve the light primer strikes three weeks ago. I can't wait to get this thing in my gun later tonight and see the results.

Edited October 26, 2010 by d_striker

[d_striker]

My gun is finally running. I'm really liking how it's shooting. A 14 lb recoil spring with loads making about 170 PF are resulting in a really soft shooting, fast cycling combo. The front sight comes right back to where it left from, if my grip and posture are correct.

I shot the indoor match at the local club. It was a lot of fun and I got another classifier under my belt.

I had two misses on two separate stages. The misses were both on the first target from the draw. I'm not sure if I was going Alpha--Mike or Mike--Alpha. What I do know is that my focus was shifting to the target to confirm hits way too much. I was looking at the target to confirm hits rather than calling my shots. The first miss was on a Virginia count classifer. I knew I missed from peeking at the target, but I couldn't make up the shot. I didn't know that I missed the second time on the 3rd stage as the target was about 15-20 yards away.

I have a match on Sunday to look forward to. You never know what the weather is going to do in Colorado, especially this time of year, but the forecast looks good. I'm going to focus on exclusively calling my shots at this match. I wish I had time to practice but it's getting dark way too early this time of year.

Edited November 4, 2010 by d_striker

[frunkenstein]

Hey d it was good to shoot the last two matches with you, and discuss XDm parts and such. Your movement is working good for you. Maybe I'll get some of my movement back in the near future.

[d_striker]

Hey d it was good to shoot the last two matches with you, and discuss XDm parts and such. Your movement is working good for you. Maybe I'll get some of my movement back in the near future.

Thanks Frank. I really need to slow down and get my hits. I had something like 10 misses for the day. If we could take my movement and pair it with your shooting, we'd be a force to be reckoned with.

It was a fun match and I had a great time.

[d_striker]

I shot the Aurora match last Sunday. It was a great time with a bunch of really fun stages that included different options for movement. My original goal for this match was to keep my eyes on the front sight and call shots but that went out the window once the timer went off. I was trying to move fast and wasn't paying enough attention to calling my shots. I had something like 10 misses for the day and finished in the bottom half. I felt good about shooting on the move though. It's becoming more and more comfortable and less of an awkward feeling.

The major lesson I learned from this match is that I need to slow down and only shoot as fast as I can see. I need to give more attention to targets that are 10 yards away and further. Right now, I'm not giving far away targets the attention they deserve.

I hope the Pueblo match is a go for this Sunday. It's supposed to be a high of 40 with a 20% chance of snow.

Edited November 12, 2010 by d_striker

[frunkenstein]

Hey dont forget your stuff HAHA

[frunkenstein]

Hey D I have one thing to say, you can't teach speed and you have it. It may be that if you take what you have and look at the postive side of that and let your sights flow I think you will go a long way. Man a quarter of your speed and I'd be happy.

[d_striker]

Hey D I have one thing to say, you can't teach speed and you have it. It may be that if you take what you have and look at the postive side of that and let your sights flow I think you will go a long way. Man a quarter of your speed and I'd be happy.

Thanks for the encouraging words. It was good shooting with you.

[d_striker]

I shot the Pueblo match on Sunday. It started out pretty cold but it could have been much worse, especially this time of year. Once it warmed up, it was in the low 40's all day with the sun going in and out behind light cloud cover. I finished well at this event but all of the heavy hitters weren't there due to the Area 2 Championships.

The last 4 matches I was shooting 180 grain Berry's but recently switched to 180 gr Zero JHP's. They take a little more powder than the Berry's to make 170 PF, but I can't tell the difference in recoil, if any, from an additional .2 gr of Universal. I also switched back to the factory 18 lb recoil spring as my sights weren't settling back to where they left from with the 14 lb spring and this new load.

I think we shot about 3 of Lizard's stages. His stages are fairly straight forward with strategically placed no shoots. His stages seem to require tight, compact movement and targets 180* apart down the length of the stage. Most of his stages are symmetrical and don't require much memory. Others are not symmetrical and it's easy to FTE certain targets.

I made a deliberate effort to track my front sight and it seemed to work. I was still trying to push it and shoot fast but I was calling shots a lot better than I have been. It was actually pretty amazing...I wasn't actually trying to call shots; I was just tracking the front sight and shot calling was just happening automatically. I'm still trying to find the proper balance between speed and accuracy. I think that if I just concentrate on focusing on my front sight, everything that needs to happen will eventually happen.

I felt like my splits were really slow but they didn't look too bad on video. I'm not sure what they actually were. The gunshots sound weird on these videos for some reason.

I had one miss on this stage. It was on the third target on the strong hand box.

I had one miss on second array. It was on a half target. I called it as a hit.

I hit two no shoots on this stage. I need to get better at shooting swingers. I seem to waste a lot of time having to shoot them on multiple passes.

I hit one no shoot as I was passing from one side to the other.

This was a classifier. I was trying to go fast but had a couple of misses that I had to make up. I called my misses correctly from Box B as there were only 2 hits on each target.

I started the day on this stage. It was a fun stage. Watching this video makes me think that I could be moving faster while shooting.

Edited November 17, 2010 by d_striker

[frunkenstein]

Hey Dom I saw somrthing on your video of stage 1. You might try and bring your weak hand accross your chest. It seems to help balance me better.

[hanexp]

Nice win on Sunday. Good shootin!

and good shootin with ya. you were blazin.

[d_striker]

Nice win on Sunday. Good shootin!

and good shootin with ya. you were blazin.

Thanks. It was a lucky win though. I was lucky enough to win stage 2 which had the most stage points while Michael P. tanked it. It looks like he was faster and shot better on most of the stages but completely tanked stage 2 which cost him the match. And like I said earlier, none of the heavy hitters were there so it was like a B/C class showdown

It was good shooting with you as well.

Edited November 18, 2010 by d_striker

[frunkenstein]

Thanks for the info from double alpha Dom. Someday the rest of the world will catch up to the 21st century like you and I, HaHa. I dont Know if I am going to make the PSAC match I am thining about it. I may go to Jasmines memorial.

[d_striker]

Thanks for the info from double alpha Dom. Someday the rest of the world will catch up to the 21st century like you and I, HaHa. I dont Know if I am going to make the PSAC match I am thining about it. I may go to Jasmines memorial.

No problem...I was surprised that it was Saul answering emails over there.

Like you said, someday.....Someday.

[d_striker]

The weather was great in Aurora today. It couldn't have been any better for late November in Colorado. My shooting, on the other hand, sucked balls.

I couldn't get off of using a target focus all day long. When I got home, I did some dryfire practice on a target at 7 yards. I noticed that if my focal plane was focused on the target, I had a hard time shifting my focus back to the front sight. In other words, I would draw and the front sight would be blurry while the target was in focus. It would take maybe half a second to focus back to the front sight. I noticed this also while practicing yesterday with four targets set up, increasing in distance from left to right. I would draw fire two shots on the close target and I noticed that I didn't really pick up speed until my focal plane shifted to my front sight. It took about two shots to finally get focused on my front sight and not the target. In the match, earlier today, my vision never really focused back to my sight. I'm wondering if this was just due to the added element of pressure from the match that's not there when practicing....But that's a whole different can of worms that I'm trying to conquer.

When I got home today, I tried something new while drawing and dry firing at 7 yards. I looked at the ground about 3 yards in front of the target so that I could still see the target in my peripheral vision. I kept my eyes unfocused while looking at the ground. I drew and made sure I had a solid grip. As I started to present the gun forward toward the target, I could clearly see my front sight in focus. I didn't have to adjust my focal plane from the target to the front sight. Instead, my front sight was the first thing that I focused on.

[CHA-LEE]

In your current learning "Phase" you are confronted with choosing to look at the targets and point shoot or watch the sights and call your shots. As you may already know doing either will yield the same shooting speed but sooner or later you will learn that the quality of your hits will consistently be worse when you look at the targets while shooting.

To overcome this decision process you need to first throw out the option of looking at the targets while shooting them. Sure, you can do it and some times "Luck" some good hits on the targets. But that is the wrong path. You need to see your sights in one fashion or another for every single shot. Once you start doing that religiously you can then turn the firing of the gun into an automated process once you SEE an acceptable sight picture for a given shot.

There is no time to look for holes in targets to confirm hits, at least not if you want to win. If you accept the fact that the only feedback tool for judging the quality of the hits are your sights when the gun fires it really does get a lot simpler. This also trains yourself into shooting only when the sight picture is acceptable.

We all can see way faster than we can manipulate the gun so don't think that seeing the sights is a bottle neck to going fast. The number one killer to staying focused on the sights is impatience. Once you get in a hurry or feel like you are behind schedule it is very easy to distract yourself by looking at targets while shooting instead of staying focused on seeing the sights.

When I shoot a stage I have two main negative things I look out for during the stage. The first is having a feeling like I have to Hurry, or Try to do something. The only internal voice I allow myself to express within my own head during a stage run is "SHOOT IT". For whatever reason these two simple words work to either speed up a sluggish run or calm me down so I can take the time to get the hit I want. The second thing is sight focus, if I start looking at targets while shooting instead of my sights I immediately force myself to refocus back onto my sights. Lately I only have to do this rarely and it usually only happens on really close hoser targets. Every time I look at targets while shooting I can see a significant reduction in the quality of my hits.

Do what you have to do in order to stay focused on the sights, such as not looking at the target before the stage run starts. But whatever you do, the end goal should be to train yourself to automatically fire the gun based on the visual input of your sights. You will know that you have reached your goal when you no longer have to decide on when to pull the trigger because it happens automatically when the appropriate sight picture is seen on target.

[CHA-LEE]

I also what to add that shooters that truly deploy this automated visual/shooting process usually fly right out of C/B class up into A/M class with relative ease. Once you no longer have to make a conscious decision on WHEN to fire the gun it saves a boat load of time in the shooting process and thus allows you to shoot that much sooner than the next guy.

[d_striker]

In your current learning "Phase" you are confronted with choosing to look at the targets and point shoot or watch the sights and call your shots. As you may already know doing either will yield the same shooting speed but sooner or later you will learn that the quality of your hits will consistently be worse when you look at the targets while shooting.

To overcome this decision process you need to first throw out the option of looking at the targets while shooting them. Sure, you can do it and some times "Luck" some good hits on the targets. But that is the wrong path. You need to see your sights in one fashion or another for every single shot. Once you start doing that religiously you can then turn the firing of the gun into an automated process once you SEE an acceptable sight picture for a given shot.

There is no time to look for holes in targets to confirm hits, at least not if you want to win. If you accept the fact that the only feedback tool for judging the quality of the hits are your sights when the gun fires it really does get a lot simpler. This also trains yourself into shooting only when the sight picture is acceptable.

We all can see way faster than we can manipulate the gun so don't think that seeing the sights is a bottle neck to going fast. The number one killer to staying focused on the sights is impatience. Once you get in a hurry or feel like you are behind schedule it is very easy to distract yourself by looking at targets while shooting instead of staying focused on seeing the sights.

When I shoot a stage I have two main negative things I look out for during the stage. The first is having a feeling like I have to Hurry, or Try to do something. The only internal voice I allow myself to express within my own head during a stage run is "SHOOT IT". For whatever reason these two simple words work to either speed up a sluggish run or calm me down so I can take the time to get the hit I want. The second thing is sight focus, if I start looking at targets while shooting instead of my sights I immediately force myself to refocus back onto my sights. Lately I only have to do this rarely and it usually only happens on really close hoser targets. Every time I look at targets while shooting I can see a significant reduction in the quality of my hits.

Do what you have to do in order to stay focused on the sights, such as not looking at the target before the stage run starts. But whatever you do, the end goal should be to train yourself to automatically fire the gun based on the visual input of your sights. You will know that you have reached your goal when you no longer have to decide on when to pull the trigger because it happens automatically when the appropriate sight picture is seen on target.

Thanks for the feedback. Everything you typed makes complete sense.

I was thinking about this yesterday and figured that the primary reason that I couldn't get away from focusing on the target was "impatience" as you phrased it. I was placing more importance on moving through the stage than shooting. I need to "follow" my sights through the COF instead of "running" them through it.

One thing I'm realizing about this sport is that it's like walking and chewing gum, on steroids.

Edited November 29, 2010 by d_striker

[wackodacko]

hello,

after tuning your striker safety, did it stop doing the light primer strikes in the cold?

I was only visiting cold weather, so am unable to test it again. springfield said there should be absolutely no oil in the striker pin channel, because when its cold, the oil gets sticky and causes lots of drag. i just bought a new EXTRA POWER striker spring from Springer and hopefully that will take care of it.

will test it by putting gun in the freezer and shooting it

[frunkenstein]

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year Dom. Catch you next year. Maybe after my surgery.