Practice vids... Your thoughts?

[MRevolutionIX]

Just a little back ground on my shooting history. I am currently a B class shooter in production and have been shooting for 2 1/2 years. I feel like I am at a point in my shooting that I need to correct the "little" things. I have a couple vids and would like your thoughts and suggestions on improvements. The things i see that needs work is my reloads and executing them more clean and maybe really driving to the next targets and speeding up my transitions. I manage to pull off a 1.12 sec draw and a 1.36 reload on a run but didnt get it on video. It felt awesome and would have like to have seen it to try and mimic the run. I have plenty of other vids on my channel and any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.

Edited July 15, 2012 by MRevolutionIX

[CHA-LEE]

Having a fast and accurate draw to first shot is all about fast hand speed, which you have, and eliminating all extra motion. You have fast enough hand speed so don't worry about going faster. From a wasted motion standpoint you have a little bit of work to do. I have listed below some things you can look at changing to eliminate extra wasted motion.....

Gripping the gun while its in the holster - You can see when your hand comes down to grip the gun your whole holster is bobbing down and back up under your "Pogo" hand motion getting your hand to and onto the gun. You are wasting time and motion by pushing down on your gun while its still in the holster. Try changing your "pogo" down then back up grab motion to only a upwards grab motion as soon as your hand STARTS to touch the gun. A common mistake people make is to build a full solid grip on the gun while its still in the holster then pull the gun out. All you need is the palm of your hand and your middle finger to start touching the gun and you can successfully start pulling the gun out of the holster. Then complete your strong hand grip as the gun is coming out of the holster.

Weak hand position - Watch your weak hand during the draw. You quickly bring it to your stomach and park it there until the gun is accelerating out towards that target and then try to build your grip by the time the gun is fully mounted. This leads to inconsistent building of the grip and thus and inconsistent sight picture. Any time wasted with your weak hand "Waiting" is wasted time. You can just as easily keep your weak hand moving towards the gun while you are still getting the gun out of the holster. Your two handed grip should start when the gun is about waist height and your grip should be solid and completed when the draw motion is about 75% completed. That way when the gun is fully extended your grip has been completed well before that and you can start shooting very accurately from a solid grip and sight picture.

Moving your Head to the gun - When the gun is fully mounted to duck your head down to the sights. During the draw the only thing moving should be your arms. You need to bring the sights to your eye. Not your eye to the sights. This means that you need to either prestage your head in the further down "Shooting" position or bring the gun higher so it meets your eye. From a pure mechanics perspective its usually better to bring the gun higher to meet your eye instead of hunching your head forward down to the gun. Keeping your head still greatly reduces the variables during the draw. Think of how the difficulty changes if you were to hit a base ball that is pitched to you verses having the ball set on a "T" in front of you. Hitting the ball of of a stationery location is WAY easier than hitting a moving ball that is pitched to you. Bobbing your head down to the gun is no different.

On the Reload you have a few things to work on.......

Fast weak hand speed - The majority of the time wasted on a reload is the time it takes for your weak hand to get from the gun, down to the mag, and then back up to the gun. Your really have to grab for the magazine aggressively with a fast hand speed slapping motion. Another thing to consider is when you slap down for the mag. As SOON as the last shot is fired you need to release your weak hand grip and slap down for the next magazine. By the time your weak hand touches the magazine your strong hand should be bringing the gun back and you have initiated the push of the mag release. By the time the new mag is coming back up to meet the gun the spent mag should have only dropped maybe a foot out of the gun. If you are really slapping down aggressively for the next mag you should almost beat the spent mag in its process of dropping out of the gun. One thing to consider is that when you perform the "Slapping Mag Grab" arm motion there is no time to change the final presentation point when you bring the magazine back up to meet the magwell. This means that you will have to change your guns "Parking Place" when you pull it back so it will meet with the magazine more effectively.

Gun position during reload - Look at where your gun "Parks" during the reload. Its in the middle of your chest below your pecks. This is very low and makes getting the new magazine into the gun a lot harder verses keeping it higher. Your goal should be to keep the magwell of the gun no lower than chin height during the reload. This keeps the gun up between your eyes and the targets so you don't have to move your head down and back up during the reload. All you need to do is move your eyes down to look towards the magwell during the reload then look back up to the targets. When you perform the "Slapping Mag Grab" the natural ending place of the mag when you bring it back up is usually really high. Keeping the gun high makes it a lot easier for them to meet. There is no time to readjust the trajectory or alignment of the magazine or gun in the middle of the reload so you need to find their natural meeting point and then burn in that new "Parking Place" location during the reload.

Change your target index WHILE you are reloading - Watch your reload. You perform the reload then after the new mag is in the gun you shift your index to the next target as you are pushing the gun out. Trying to index to the next target after the reload is done usually leads to poor hits because you are trying to cram really aggressive left/right movement into the mounting process as you get the gun on target. You need to start the smooth target to target index transition as soon as your weak hand leaves the gun at the start of the reload. That way your indexed on the next target long before the actual reload is complete.

[MRevolutionIX]

THAT'S WHAT IM TALKING ABOUT! Im glad i posted this and you saw it. Its funny how things are... When somebody explains the issues, as you have, that " oh yeah" moment happens! Thanks CHA-LEE! Ill work on those things and keep you posted. Hopefully the next time you see my vids I will have the things you mentioned incorporated.