Slumdog Grandmaster

[inkballedtarget]

Hey dude,

I too am a college student and I know where you're coming from! I am a brand new shooter and Im totally stoked about shooting my first match! I have really enjoyed reading your thread. Congrats on making A class, thats really impressive how fast you made that happen! Good luck at your big match! Hope all goes well!

Take care!

[DonovanM]

Hey dude,

I too am a college student and I know where you're coming from! I am a brand new shooter and Im totally stoked about shooting my first match! I have really enjoyed reading your thread. Congrats on making A class, thats really impressive how fast you made that happen! Good luck at your big match! Hope all goes well!

Take care!

Sweet! Get out there and dry fire the crap out of whatever you're running. I try to have my gun in my hand at least an hour a day. Probably comes to half that on average over the past year or so.

I consider myself HUGELY fortunate that prior to going back to school, I did have somewhat of a decently well paying job, allowing me to finance a training class, which is when I REALLY got into shooting. Unfortunately I got laid off right before the course, LOL

Taking a class is highly recommended, either way. It certainly put me on the right path.

[DonovanM]

Shot a big match this weekend. Well, it was only a Level 1, but they had prizes and 8 pretty big stages. My results are here: http://www.uspsa.org/uspsa-display-match-results-detail.php?action=summary&indx=2206&compid=10

Yep, I got 7th place, and shot 80% of the high score. And yep, that's with NINE penalties. LOL! I made so many mistakes, but I'm proud of my performance nonetheless. Had the best time on 2 of the stages, but on one my hits were lame and conservative due to there being so much hard cover, and on the other one I nailed a no-shoot right in the face.

I got video of 7/8 stages, but don't have the right cable to get it on my machine yet.

Edited July 28, 2011 by DonovanM

[OpenDot]

Shot a big match this weekend. Well, it was only a Level 1, but they had prizes and 8 pretty big stages. My results are here: http://www.uspsa.org/uspsa-display-match-results-detail.php?action=summary&indx=2191&compid=10

Yep, I got 7th place, and shot 80% of the high score. And yep, that's with NINE penalties. LOL! I made so many mistakes, but I'm proud of my performance nonetheless. Had the best time on 2 of the stages, but on one my hits were lame and conservative due to there being so much hard cover, and on the other one I nailed a no-shoot right in the face.

I got video of 7/8 stages, but don't have the right cable to get it on my machine yet.

Video damnit!!!!

Congrats on the finish!!

[DonovanM]

Shot a big match this weekend. Well, it was only a Level 1, but they had prizes and 8 pretty big stages. My results are here: http://www.uspsa.org/uspsa-display-match-results-detail.php?action=summary&indx=2191&compid=10

Yep, I got 7th place, and shot 80% of the high score. And yep, that's with NINE penalties. LOL! I made so many mistakes, but I'm proud of my performance nonetheless. Had the best time on 2 of the stages, but on one my hits were lame and conservative due to there being so much hard cover, and on the other one I nailed a no-shoot right in the face.

I got video of 7/8 stages, but don't have the right cable to get it on my machine yet.

Video damnit!!!!

Congrats on the finish!!

Thanks. I'll have it up Saturday, I promise. I got the right cable but neither of my computers have a firewire port... argh.

[DonovanM]

Finally I get to spice up this thread with some VIDEO!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdU8ObqBWQ4

On a related note, I was over at my parents' house to upload this beast and showed my mom the video. She asked me if I was shooting real bullets (it was 124gr Federal AE, to boot) and how I do my reloads so fast. WIN!!

Edited July 30, 2011 by DonovanM

[OpenDot]

Yo.... you alive?

[DonovanM]

LOL, yes. I forgot to update this thing, but not much has really happened since my last update. Other than getting DQed (2nd video). Still working on my speed, and am thus dropping a ton of points and zeroing a few stages. I'm not worried though, all part of the learning process.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOgYXTxtT10

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKlcrvihDxw

[DonovanM]

Here's a video of my most recent match. I hauled too much ass and ended up in 6th place with 6 mikes and 1 NS. I seem to be pretty consistent, being in the top 5 or 6 for half of my stages and the rest being crap.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMi9A402ZJM

[DonovanM]

Apparently I can't have my cake or eat it either. I went into today's match wanting to just shoot Alphas, but I didn't. Hosed my ass off again. Can't really get anywhere without shooting good points, I know I know.

Also had a wonderful stage-killing FTE on my 2nd to last mag when I needed all of them. Note to self: carry 5 on the belt. And buy a gun that works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkCUs26ajv4

[Chris iliff]

Yeah, it sucks battling bad equipment. Keep positive and get it running, watching your vids proves you have some skills.

[HuskySig]

And buy a gun that works.

Or leave the gun smithing up to someone who knows what they are doing?

I've watched you shoot a number of times and it's always the same thing. The buzzer goes off and you shoot at one speed, max speed. You really need to learn how to take your foot off the gas and stop shooting at "Brown" and start shooting at the A zone.

[DonovanM]

And buy a gun that works.

Or leave the gun smithing up to someone who knows what they are doing?

I've watched you shoot a number of times and it's always the same thing. The buzzer goes off and you shoot at one speed, max speed. You really need to learn how to take your foot off the gas and stop shooting at "Brown" and start shooting at the A zone.

I definitely don't know what I'm doing, but, I don't think molesting the trigger would cause failures in the extraction process. And that's all I've done since I put an uncut 14lb Wolff recoil spring back in at Bruce's suggestion. Full power springs never seem to work with the factory 115gr ammo I shoot. My "buying a gun that works" comment was just frustration, what I really need is more powerful ammo.

Got any tips for breaking my speed habit? You're right of course. I show up for a match all primed to shoot points, then once the buzzer goes off it all goes out the window

[GLOCK PILOT]

"Got any tips for breaking my speed habit"

I think it's just a focus and patience issue. I've been going through something similar. 1)Shooting crappy points because I wasn't focusing, and 2)I would pull off targets before I broke the second shot because I didn't have the patience. I don't think you are doing the second one, I just was using it as an example.

What helps me is what "HuskySig" said. Don't just shoot at the brown.

Think of the "A" zone as the target, and same thing for steel. The target is the center of the plate or popper.

I feel if you do this the shooting speed will be about the same, but your focus and patience will have changed so you will be watching the sights and drilling A's and steel one for one.

Just be smooth!

Hope that helped

Alex

[DonovanM]

2)I would pull off targets before I broke the second shot because I didn't have the patience. I don't think you are doing the second one, I just was using it as an example.

I might do this. I looked at the 2nd shot on the very first target in the video I just posted and I think I started my transition to the steel right before the bullet left the barrel. It was barely perceptible but probably enough to throw a charlie.

Think of the "A" zone as the target, and same thing for steel. The target is the center of the plate or popper.

Mmm... I like that. I think I've heard it before but it definitely bears repeating.

I feel if you do this the shooting speed will be about the same, but your focus and patience will have changed so you will be watching the sights and drilling A's and steel one for one.

I'm pretty good on steel when I remember to take into account how low my POI is with 115gr. On those 20yd plates in the beginning of the video I put the top of my front sight at the top of the plate but I still hit on the lower 1/4.

Hope that helped

It did. Thanks!

Edited September 19, 2011 by DonovanM

[benos]

Hit and miss:

Calling shots

You need to fix that. Watch your sights "bounce" as you shoot into a dirt bank (no target). Calling shots must become your shoooting way of life, to shoot consistenly on all targets.

Weaknesses:

Medium and close range fast accuracy (too many C's and D's... and M's...)

You are most likely just "shooting at brown."

For every target - find the middle of the target, shoot the middle of the target.

be

[HuskySig]

...failures in the extraction process.

This is probably a dumb question, so my apologies. When was the last time you pulled the extractor to clean it along with the channel it sits in? I remember about half through my first season of USPSA I was at Puyallup and my P226ST started failing to extract. At one point the RO looks at me and asks very matter of factly "When was the last time you cleaned the extractor." My response to him was something like "You have to clean the extractor?" Turns out a clean (external) extractor is a happy extractor, even on Sigs. I pull mine about every 1000 rounds or so to clean it and the channel.

Got any tips for breaking my speed habit?

Visual patience is a common saying around here. It's true though. You have to work on developing the same satisfaction shooting Alphas that you have right now just shooting Brown. Speed is not your issue. Imagine how good you're going to do when you develop the skill to consistently call your shots. The video from Marysville is a perfect example of where you're losing massive amounts of time. You shoot at a piece of steel, think you hit it and start to move only to realize you missed. Then you have to go back, reset, and shoot again.

I understand that disposable income for practice ammo is tough to come by, but live fire practice is really the only way to learn how to call your shots. Dry fire can do a lot of things, but without doing the live fire practice to verify your skills it can be fairly misleading.

[DonovanM]

Hit and miss:

Calling shots

You need to fix that. Watch your sights "bounce" as you shoot into a dirt bank (no target). Calling shots must become your shoooting way of life, to shoot consistenly on all targets.

Weaknesses:

Medium and close range fast accuracy (too many C's and D's... and M's...)

You are most likely just "shooting at brown."

For every target - find the middle of the target, shoot the middle of the target.

be

Heh, you've probably written that post a thousand times. Calling your shots is the game in a nutshell, right?

I wish I could edit my OP, it's not entirely accurate anymore, and it kills me how naive I was, now that reality has sunk in

...failures in the extraction process.

This is probably a dumb question, so my apologies. When was the last time you pulled the extractor to clean it along with the channel it sits in? I remember about half through my first season of USPSA I was at Puyallup and my P226ST started failing to extract. At one point the RO looks at me and asks very matter of factly "When was the last time you cleaned the extractor." My response to him was something like "You have to clean the extractor?" Turns out a clean (external) extractor is a happy extractor, even on Sigs. I pull mine about every 1000 rounds or so to clean it and the channel.

LOL. You know, it has been awhile since I cleaned it. It's such a gigantic pain in the ass to take out that I don't really bother when I detail strip and clean everything else after every match.

Got any tips for breaking my speed habit?

Visual patience is a common saying around here. It's true though. You have to work on developing the same satisfaction shooting Alphas that you have right now just shooting Brown. Speed is not your issue. Imagine how good you're going to do when you develop the skill to consistently call your shots. The video from Marysville is a perfect example of where you're losing massive amounts of time. You shoot at a piece of steel, think you hit it and start to move only to realize you missed. Then you have to go back, reset, and shoot again.

I understand that disposable income for practice ammo is tough to come by, but live fire practice is really the only way to learn how to call your shots. Dry fire can do a lot of things, but without doing the live fire practice to verify your skills it can be fairly misleading.

Yeah. Guess it's time to save up for that reloading press and club membership fees. I just bought a new computer too... woops.

Thanks for the help!

[DonovanM]

Something interesting happened today at a classifier match. I actually saw what I needed to see for more of my shots than is normal, and put down the most consistent and some of the best scores I've ever gotten, most of them being right at my classification level. I also won the match, but everyone was at Nats.

Interesting note: Last time I ran Table Stakes I shot it clean in 4.53 (94%). Today I shot it with 1 charlie in 4.55. The charlie kills the score but I love how close the times were.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owMY9rJUwLc

Edited September 26, 2011 by DonovanM

[OpenDot]

Nice work brotha!!!!!!

[DonovanM]

Couple new vids here. Got a new camera - a ContourROAM - it kicks ass.

Haven't shot in a few months, so not much to report other than I'm still working on the vision. Still getting hung up on going fast. Making progress though. Not much I can do about it in dry fire except to relax and nail good quality repetitions. This is a tough habit to overcome!

This match was a mess. Gun problems from putting on a new extended slide stop and one completely hosed stage due to a rushed plan. Also boned the classifier and the SHO stage with the no shoots - hit 4 of them. Sucks not getting any live fire practice, all I'd work on is calling shots.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=089UmpSLSlE

This charity match was a lot of fun and was for a good cause. Shooting wise, I boned my follow up shots on the 30 yard headshots - missed every one of them, only one hit per target. I think they were going just slightly high? That was my only real major mistake of the match. Molested that plate rack though, proud of myself for that.

I shot the best points in this match that I have in a while. Not at my goal of 90%, but close. What's funny is that in my 2nd match ever, I shot almost 95% of the points. Then I started wanting to go fast

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXg23UZvHSw

Shooting goals for 2012:

1.) Don't earn a DQ.

2/2 on this one so far. POV cameras really keep you honest when it comes to seeing what your trigger finger is doing.

2.) Shoot 90% of the points available in every match.

0/2

[DonovanM]

Latest vid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gc1FrPqeJNs

Something interesting that I noticed on one stage, I still wasn't able to shoot good points even on demand. I had that in my head until I shot the next stage where I shot 28 alphas and 3 charlies... and one mike. So apparently I did something right minus that one shot.

Finding it hard to find that right balance between speed/accuracy (I wonder if I'm the only one? ) So far all my shooting seems to be too fast/not enough points or enough points/not fast enough.

I've also been futzing around with this new grip. I use it every time I dryfire, but I've only reverted to it 2-3 times live. Practicing with ammo would help. Oh well.

Edited February 13, 2012 by DonovanM

[CHA-LEE]

Cool videos!!!!

I would like to give you a suggestion though. Given your shooting skills and current classification you are falling into the same rut as a lot of other A & M class shooters. You are some times making the shooting a lot more difficult than it has to be. For example, you pick a stage plan that has you shooting on the move while entering or exiting a shooting position which has your shooting slowed way down due to the difficulty of the shooting you are creating. The only time you should shoot on the move multiple steps entering or exiting a shooting position is IF it allows you to transition and engage targets directly out of the first position and into another. Such as starting at a forward port and the second shooting position is a few steps back and to the right or left. You could shoot as you retreat to the second position so it allows you to immediately engage targets in the second position. BUT this should only be done IF you can keep your shooting speed the same as a solid dug in standing position while you are moving back to the second position, which is not easy. In all of the testing that I have done with planted feet shooting positions verses shooting on the move while entering or exiting the shooting position I was ALWAYS able to shoot faster and more accurately while standing. The most time consuming thing we do during any stage run is actual shooting. Knowing this you should always strive for a stage plan that allows you to get the SHOOTING done as soon as possible. Injecting unneeded shooting on the move that slows your shooting speed way down is very counter productive from a time and points perspective. In your next practice session test it out yourself. Setup a two shooting box drill where you start in box A and have to finish in box B. Then shoot it two different ways. The first way try engage the targets in box A on the move as you move over to Box B. Take note of your time and hit quality. Then shoot it again where you take a planted shooting position in Box A then hose down everything there THEN move to box B and finish the run. Don't be surprised if your time and hit quality is dramatically better on the second method.

The point I am trying to make is that its often easy for A & M Class shooters to execute effective shooting on the move skills, but then apply them inappropriately to a stage plan simply because they can do it. Just because you can do it does not make it the best plan. I would suggest you watch a bunch of videos of the top end GM's shoot stages. More often than not they are using planted foot shooting position while engaging targets. On top of this when they are engaging targets on the move they are actually shooting while only on one foot between strides, thus creating yet another stable shooting platform. You will rarely see them taking multiple steps WHILE shooting on the move. A lot of times they pick stage plans that have them planting, getting the shooting done as fast as possible then moving hard to the next shooting position. Could they shoot the whole stage on the move? Sure. But they know that would slow down their shooting and negatively impact their hit quality so much it would end up being overall worse than shooting it from multiple stationary positions.

Lastly, here is a priceless breakdown of what works best for shooting these kind of pistol matches. IPSC = I Prefer to Shoot Closer. As silly as this sounds it is totally true. If you have a choice of shooting stuff further away, but slower, or getting closer so you can shoot faster it is almost always more effective to get closer and shoot faster. As I said before, the most time consuming thing is the actual shooting time. So choose stage plans that allow you to shoot fast but effectively capture 90% - 95% of the points. Staying further back and risking longer shooting time and worse points by hunting and pecking for targets if you don't hit a shooting position exactly perfect has a HUGE crash and burn factor. I will always pick a stage plan that gets me closer to the targets so I can engage them faster, especially if I am forced to go there anyway due to target location. Now if I can eliminate a whole shooting position by engaging things further away that takes some thought and hit factor math to figure out the best choice. You always have to do the hit factor math to see if eliminating a shooting position but making the shooting a lot more difficult is worth it. To do this you need to know what your shooting speed and hit quality is at every distance. If you don't know how long these things take then you can not make an effective determination on the longer shots being an advantage or not. Setup, shoot and time these different shooting conditions in practice so you KNOW what you can do and how long it takes.

Hopefully these comments help you take your shooting game to the next level. Good luck and have fun!!!

[DonovanM]

Oh wow - thanks for the huge comments! I watched a couple of my vids again and I see exactly what you mean. Definitely something I'll look for when I'm planning future stages

[CHA-LEE]

I reread my post and thought I would add a little more clarification. Shooting on the move is a must have skill for this sport to fully optimize stages. You must also be able to optimize your entry and exit from the shooting positions. Such as engaging targets as you enter or exit the shooting position. But this has to be done in moderation. I have a personal rule about this that has served my specific shooting skills well. This rule is that I will always look for opportunities to engaging targets during my first planted foot step in or out of the shooting position, but no more than that. For example, while entering a shooting position I will see what targets I can start engaging after I plant my first foot into the stationary shooting position. While I am exiting I will identify which target(s) I can engage before I lift my trailing foot out of the stationary shooting position.

You really can’t think of this as a “Stationary” shooting position because you could be moving your upper body through the shooting position the whole time while engaging the targets. By “Stationary” I mean planted feet or a planted foot. To effectively do this you need to take a single wide and low shooting stance which allows you to bend your knees to keep your upper body moving though the shooting position then launch out of it effectively. This only works if you pick the correct width stance that allows you to rock your upper body back and forth to see all of the targets without lifting your feet or shuffling around. Any time you shuffle your feet around your shooting speed and accuracy goes to crap.

I guess what I am trying to say is that your “Want” to shoot on the move through the shooting positions is a good thing to always think about. But how you deploy that movement through the shooting position should be done with planted feet and upper body movement. Not taking multiple shuffle steps as you try to engage targets on the move into or out of the shooting position. I hope this makes sense. If not let me know.