New Shooters - Keeping them coming back

[Gun Geek]

Need some advice here:

We're getting some feedback from our new IDPA shooters (half the shooters at our last 2 matches) that, and I'm paraphrasing here, "real IDPA" stages are too intimidating and make new shooters uncomfortable.

I think what they're getting at is that they are struggling with things like tactical priority (leads to procedurals), targets hidden by non-threats, moving and shooting, and reloads. No surprise - this stuff can be hard. People have told me that they feel like they want to shoot a stage again, after they shot it the first time ('cause now they know how).

The comments have centered around "Less intimidation, more fun".

The core of this seems to be rooted in the desire to not make a fool of one's self and to focus more on the shooting skills and less on the defensive tactics. I think they would like to stand still and do plateracks and poppers with no cover or movement.

Have you guys experienced this? what have you done.

Geek

[snokid]

Well it's truely hard to please all the people all the time...

One group of guys want's moving targets, higher round count stages, harder courses of fire if you will...

the next group would like all the targets at arms lenght and pretty much stand still and shoot...

What we try and do at our club is to please both groups as much as possible...

let's say we have 5 stages, well a couple of them might be that you are sitting at the kitchen table cleaning your gun when some bad guys show up and you shoot them while seated, and the targets are pretty close. or something like this you get the idea...

then a couple of stages are more invovled shoot thru this window, tact load then shoot thru next window, another tact load then shoot thru a door. making the shots longer 15-18 yards. adding more movement, there might be 15 yards of movement in that stage.

then we usually have a speed stage, IE... triple bill drill's, el-pres type of stuff...

What this seems to do is kind of even out the playing field, some guys don't move all that fast, others can shoot fast, but not hit far away targets worth a crap(that's me)

What you kind of need to do is figure out your shooter base and taylor your match to your base of shooters yet still make it fun. If you only run stand and shoot stages your going to loose the more seasoned shooters that want more.

one thing that seems to be common with our base of shooters is that they would like the match to be close to 2 boxes of ammo, 80-100 round matches, as not everyone reloads so some poor guy having to buy 3 boxes of 45 is into it pretty good by the time he shoots your match, keeping it to 2 boxes seems to be the way to go.

Bob

[Flexmoney]

Yeah, you gotta know YOUR customers.

Try to keep the match at a level that is always a bit of a challenge to the shooters. If you dumb it down too much, they will never improve. if it is too hard, they might not come back.

If you have a fairly new group, introduce just one (or just a few) technical aspects at each match...then build on those as the shooters aquire those skills.

A sly match director/stage designer can "teach" his customers how to shoot (to some degree) by the design of the shooting problem(s).

Fun, but challenging.

[tightloop]

Flex

Are you that well known IDPA shooter we hear so much about in Ohio?

[Bill Nesbitt]

Flex

Are you that well known IDPA shooter we hear so much about in Ohio?

Just waiting to see Flex's answer to this one.

Bill Nesbitt

[tightloop]

Me too..

[Flexmoney]

Hmmm....I read the question..broke it down...found it wasn't specific to IDPA or OHio (???).

I offered up a response in an attempt to help answer the question. Feel free to do the same.

[scandog]

I actually go over each match with Sno and another shooter before setting it up. That helps me to keep it something everyone will like. We are also going to start requiring our new shooter at our indoor matches to view Matt B's new DVD prior to shooting. We will set up and have it playing for them. It is a lot to take in the first time, but it will hopefully help with cover and reloads before they ever set foot on the range.

I wish I could require it before our outside matches.

[tightloop]

flex

Just teasing...

[AikiDale]

Hi Geek,

If I remember correctly you are shooting at an indoor range? If you have the space for more than a couple of stages you might try having one stage set up as part of your classifier for new folks. They will get to practice basic skills and can see their progress on stages which will be familiar as they learn. Each month do another stage. Since each is 30 rounds let everyone shoot it twice if they like. When they are ready, let them progress to the full match. A Novice and Regular Division if you will.

[Gary Stevens]

Hey Geek, I can account for three of your missing shooters, me Allen and Jason Ratliff. I mentioned to you about my prior committment, and Allen won't go shooting without me to harrass him Of course Jason relies on Allen, so I guess I cost you three shooters

We wil be back next month, schedules permitting.

Thanks for your efforts to the shooting sport.

[Gun Geek]

Gary:

I wasn't worried about you guys, and I know there will always be some rotation in and out. 2 matches are not enough to judge whether we're losing shooters anyway. Lastly, you guys aren't new shooters

I'm more concerned about the feedback of "less intimidating stages" that will lose shooters, but I don't want our matches to skills training events.

Thanks for following our progress. I'm putting together a group to come show you how to shoot IDPA!

[L9X25]

Many years ago, our current club was divided into 2 clubs. One club was focused on C, D & U class shooters and the difficulty was kept at that level. The other club focused on the M, A & B shooters and was known for aggressive and difficult matches that challenged that level of shooter. Anybody could shoot whatever match(es) they choose but the variety was there. Most shooters started at the easy matches and eventually shot both matches, when they felt confident enough.

You cannot have it both ways ... if you have ANY stages that will challenge a M-A-B shooter, you may frustrate many of the C-D-U shooters enough that they might get discouraged. If you keep all of the stages at the C-D-U comfort level, you chase off the M-A-B shooters. I realize that this is an IDPA discussion, and my example is IPSC, but the same principle applies ... please your customer, by giving him/her what they want, of they will go away.

Leo

[shred]

After going around on this one for a while with local clubs, my current theory for club matches is that the good shooters will always compete on points and efficiency, no matter if the actual shots are challenging for them or not. Thus, making stages a bit (a bit) easier shooting-wise is probably best for attracting and keeping new shooters. Challenge the experts by giving them multiple positions and options to work with.

[DogmaDog]

I think stages become intimidating only when they are very complicated...like the "Restricted Area" stage at the Florida Open where it was difficult to keep track of which targets you had shot, and which you hadn't.

An IDPA stage which convoluted tactical sequence and tactical priority, and made it difficult to figure out what order to shoot the targets in would be intimidating. Three targets at 30 yards is just challenging, but not intimidating.

I would recommend stages designed to emphasize individual aspects of IDPA shooting. Have one stage requiring engaging targets in tac sequence (hitting all targets once before hitting any twice). Have another with tactical priority (hitting targets from nearest to farthest). Don't mix the two.

You might also try more stages with multiple strings. That way, if they get a procedural on one string, they get an opportunity to shoot it the right way on the next string.

DogmaDog

[BillD]

Multiple strings on the same COF REALLY slow down the match. You end up with shooters standing around.

[shred]

One more thing to consider for everybody with this problem-- it may not be the stages that are scaring your new shooters away. Are your experienced shooters friendly and helpful to the newbies? Do they squad off by themselves? Are new shooters coached as needed? Is there a lot of standing around that could be avoided?

[Gun Geek]

Shred:

That is an excellent point. Luckily, we did think about that, and I talked to those experienced folks about it before hand. From what I've noticed the experienced guys are very helpful to the new shooters.

What I'm thinking about is a mentoring approach - pairing a new shooter and an old salt together.

Keep the comments comming guys. This is very helpful.

[Gary Stevens]

Hey Geek,

What would you think about some mid week training sessions for your new folk? If you could get them together and give them basic training so to speak, they might not be so intimidated at the real match. Let them practice the stuff they don't really understand right now, and they might pick right up and start running.

Also since they will be the ones shooting, they will not be intimidated by someone ripping off a good run and then them feeling the pressure to do the same.

[Duane Thomas]

At my IDPA club, the club president or MD will ask ask, during the pre-match shooter's meeting, "Are there any new shooters here?" A new shooter being defined as anyone who has never fired an IDPA match. Then those shooters are split off into their own squad with an experienced shooter - usually the club president himself - to take them aside, explain the rules of the sport, and help them through the stages. Emphasis is on just getting them through the experience as safely and painlessly as possible. They're told, "Don't try to be fast, just be safe."

I always felt, BTW, it might work really well to have at least one very experienced shooter on the squad, that the new guys might get a kick out of seeing someone run the stage well. I was told this was a bad idea because the newbies might try to run the stage as fast as the experienced guy. At the last match, however, I got asked onto the newbie squad to help with the walk-thoughs. (I won the match, BTW.) And everyone seemed to have a ball, definitely the most relaxed, happy squad I've been on in awhile - even the guys taking, like, four times as long as myself to run the stage.

We're getting some feedback from our new IDPA shooters (half the shooters at our last 2 matches) that, and I'm paraphrasing here, "real IDPA" stages are too intimidating and make new shooters uncomfortable.

Perhaps a mix of scenarios and standards exercises would best meet your needs. I do have to say the whole "confusing and intimidating" complaint strikes me as a bit lame. You do have walkthroughs, right? That pretty much tells them how to run the stage. Don't have the newbies up first, let them watch someone more experienced run it. After that, any complaints are just whining.

[Gun Geek]

Duane:

We do have walk through, no question. But we usually have some stages that the shooter doesn't get to watch the other shooters resolve. We had some problems with people complaining that by going first, they were at an unfair advantage (yes, these are newbies, too).

Gary:

Great minds think alike - we have a skills class set up for a Saturday afternoon, and advertised it at the match. No takers yet.

[dpeters8445]

Duane:

We do have walk through, no question. But we usually have some stages that the shooter doesn't get to watch the other shooters resolve. We had some problems with people complaining that by going first, they were at an unfair advantage (yes, these are newbies, too).

I never liked the idea of these kind of stages where your not aloud to look at the course of fire before you shoot it. I think that this kind of stage is just plain unfair. After all, someone has to set the stage up and people have to paste and reset targets.

[shred]

I always felt, BTW, it might work really well to have at least one very experienced shooter on the squad, that the new guys might get a kick out of seeing someone run the stage well. I was told this was a bad idea because the newbies might try to run the stage as fast as the experienced guy.

It's probably better in IDPA where things are a bit more orderly and equipment is more stock, but what I've noticed in IPSC matches as the beginner-squad-hot-shot is that the new shooters that come after you will tend to shoot it the way you did, even though it may be inappropriate for them-- not enough rounds in the gun, shooting on the move, long tight shots, equipment differences, etc.

For IPSC (yes I know this is the IDPA board, I'll stop now) It may be better to fit the new squad with some B & C class shooters shooting limited-10 and production instead of your local open M's.

[yeahyeah]

My son and I have been shooting ISPC, and IDPA for the best part of three months now. The first time we shot matches it was ugly, ie. shoot to slide lock reload and not drop the slide, missing targets, shoot two mags. at one steel just to knock it down and every other possable mess up! IDPA is still a problem, reloads with retention, Tach reloads, and the like (can't help but drop that mag. on the dirt), but each and every time we shoot the people we shoot with are KOOL so it's know big deal. The first few times we shot if we made a mistake (not safety related), the other shooters would tell us are mistakes, and show us the correct way to do things. No big penaltys, or percedurals and things like that, they knew we didn't have a chance...so what if they gave us a point or two they made us feel at home. Now we know better we get zapped if we screw up, as it should be. All you have to do is explain mistakes and procedure when the pressure hits them (us), and keep the range Nazis away from then when they start. I have been a newbie at a lot of sports, (racing karts and street bikes) and had to learn them all, If the people around you are about havin fun it will be fine, If you have some old fart givin people crap then keep them away untill the newbies learn, then they'll be able to hold there own. Don't hold their hands just make them welcome, they WILL come back...we did!!

And on that note this would be a good time to say "THANKS" To all the people at the Richmond Hotshots...you know who you are. "THANKS"

[Duane Thomas]

We had some problems with people complaining that by going first, they were at an unfair advantage (yes, these are newbies, too).

You're talking about surprise stages, right?

I think this complaint comes under the "just whining" heading, as well. If no one gets to see the stage until they shoot - i.e. they're not allowed to tape, reset steel, or watch the other shooters run the stage - what difference does it make whether you go first or tenth?