Epiphany: USPSA is TWO sports

[sdm74]

I was thinking another book needed to be written on this,

then I thought a paper could cover this....

Then after thinking about this a little longer figured a pamphlet could do it.......

But instead I just tore off a piece of paper and wrote this down to cover it

(selling these for $50)

Pm sent..waiting on paypal address

[JakeMartens]

I was thinking another book needed to be written on this,

then I thought a paper could cover this....

Then after thinking about this a little longer figured a pamphlet could do it.......

But instead I just tore off a piece of paper and wrote this down to cover it

(selling these for $50)

Pm sent..waiting on paypal address

jakemartens@comcast.net

(did it under personal and as a gift, don't want to get the 3% charge)

[JakeMartens]

I was thinking another book needed to be written on this,

then I thought a paper could cover this....

Then after thinking about this a little longer figured a pamphlet could do it.......

But instead I just tore off a piece of paper and wrote this down to cover it

(selling these for $50)

Can I get that in audiobook format?

I have Morgan Freeman working on it right now, but for $50 I will call and leave you a voicemail....

[bbbean]

Can I get that in audiobook format?

I have Morgan Freeman working on it right now, but for $50 I will call and leave you a voicemail....

[forddriver]

After screwing my classifier for the fourth time while doing better and better

I am glad i am not the only one who did that.

[Steve Anderson]

I wouldn't say we have two sports, but I will agree that a classifier and a field course don't have a lot in common except this:

The guy that gets the most points per second gets all the stage points.

I spent 18 months of my life obsessed with becoming a GM. I had a DVD of Blake Miguez and wanted to do "that."

As I shot classifiers, I observed that most of them were 6 shots, a reload, and 6 more shots.

I got really good at "that."

And you know what sucks? Being a GM that can't shoot field courses very well. I spent a couple years treating field courses as a group of classifiers with a sprint in bewtween. That wins locally, sucks nationally.

And then just this year I finally figured it out.

The guy that gets the most points per second get all the stage points.

I think the best way to train for "both" sports is to dry fire the crap out of your draws and reloads (measured in hours per day, not minutes)and then practice shooting while moving in live fire.

In a field course, if you're not shooting, you're not getting ANY points per second. NONE.

Always be shooting, always be moving.

[theycallmeingot]

I wouldn't say we have two sports, but I will agree that a classifier and a field course don't have a lot in common except this:

The guy that gets the most points per second gets all the stage points.

I spent 18 months of my life obsessed with becoming a GM. I had a DVD of Blake Miguez and wanted to do "that."

As I shot classifiers, I observed that most of them were 6 shots, a reload, and 6 more shots.

I got really good at "that."

And you know what sucks? Being a GM that can't shoot field courses very well. I spent a couple years treating field courses as a group of classifiers with a sprint in bewtween. That wins locally, sucks nationally.

And then just this year I finally figured it out.

The guy that gets the most points per second get all the stage points.

I think the best way to train for "both" sports is to dry fire the crap out of your draws and reloads (measured in hours per day, not minutes)and then practice shooting while moving in live fire.

In a field course, if you're not shooting, you're not getting ANY points per second. NONE.

Always be shooting, always be moving.

sounds like sound advice. I just bought your dryfire book, and I should have done it last year when I started shooting.

My biggest epiphany lately is that once you get good at getting alphas at any distance that a course would demand, and on any level of tight shot, no shoots, hard cover, etc, it will surprise you how little time you actually need to do it. It was easy for me to get stuck in a 90-95% of the points rut, where my times were literally twice as slow as GMs. I pushed myself to cut my times in half, which would theoretically make me beat the GMs. As a result, they are not cut in half, but what used to be a 30 sec stage for me is now an 18sec one, while a GM will run it in 15. And the points don't have to suffer to accomplish this. It's mostly a head game, and trusting yourself and your ability to hit As quickly.

You will never win, if people are doing stages in half of your time.

You will never win, if people are doing stages with twice your points.

So it's pretty simple. Don't trade one for the other. Do both.

[Ben Stoeger]

I spent a couple years treating field courses as a group of classifiers with a sprint in bewtween. That wins locally, sucks nationally.

In two sentences you got a lot of great stuff going on.

Field courses aren’t about running, they are about efficiency. Ideally you have a constant stream of bullets coming out at any available targets, you are reloading, or you are moving. Combine those things if you can.

Lots of seriously stupid stuff “works” locally.

[seanc]

Lots of seriously stupid stuff “works” locally.

My favorite quote is very similar.

"That something 'works' is irrelevant. Lots of moronic stuff 'works'. That does not make it correct or not moronic". -lyle mcdonald

Edited September 4, 2012 by seanc

[glefos]

The guy that gets the most points per second gets all the stage points..

In a field course, if you're not shooting, you're not getting ANY points per second. NONE.

Always be shooting, always be moving.

Wisdom.

[Chip_E]

Warning...this may be the longer version of Jake's most excellent (and efficient) piece of paper.

Personally, getting a classification or winning some stage, match, or plaque isn't why I shoot. Don't get me wrong, I like when/if it happens, but that's not WHY I do it. I shoot because I love doing it, and more importantly because wifEy loves doing it. It's OUR thing, OUR sport. That said, the classification system does allow me to gauge my improvement in the sport. At first I really hated the system...because I felt like it was based on a curve set by the super-humans that compete in the World Shoot and such. I felt like the bar was set too high. But as I have more data, I see that it's a fair and accurate skills assessment. Locally, I can shoot from about 70% to an occasional 90% (depending on if any of our local GMs show up). When I go to major matches, I'm in the mid to upper 50% range (GMs keep showing up and raising the bar...let's not mention KC at Ohio). When I shot a classifier yesterday, (cold, no advance notice or practice, and my first stage of the day) I pulled a 61%. So yeah, considering what I usually shoot overall, 61% sounds accurate...if not a bit high for my current ability. The classifier gives me the ability to assess my improvement without regarding who I was shooting with at the time (more on that later).

As to, "how do you shoot classifiers better?". That's easy....by shooting better. Like Jake, Ben, and others said, it's all about shooting accurately as fast as you can. The big key is the order. It's not "Shoot as fast as you accurately can". First you have to be able to shoot accurately PERIOD. If you can't consistently shoot Alphas at a slow pace, there's no way the Alpha hits will magically appear by going faster. However, you'll find that if you're consistent in your fundamentals (stance, draw, grip, trigger prep, sight acquisition, etc.) you'll be able to hit Alphas consistently...and when you start hitting Alphas consistently, the magic happens. The magic is that you'll automatically gain more confidence, and that confidence will translate into shooting accurately faster. Likewise, over-confidence will translate into sloppy shooting (Mikes and No-Shoots). Focusing on fundamentals will get you a lot further than focusing on classifiers...or even on winning stages or matches. One of my mentors told me, "Anyone can beat anyone at one time on any stage". Another way of saying that is...just because you get a score higher than the local GM doesn't mean you're a better shooter, or that you've improved. More likely it means he had equipment or some other issues with the stage. Your goal should be to beat yourself...that's a constant. If you work on beating yourself instead of others, you'll improve faster, and have more fun doing it. Bottom line, don't practice shooting classifiers, and don't worry about how you compared to other shooters (there's a time for that). Instead, concentrate on shooting better, and beating yourself on each practice session and on each stage.

[pjb45]

Steve's advice is right on. His second book is really good. Like the Paul Simon song "50 ways to leave....." or as he puts it, whittling a toothpick with a chainsaw.

BTW: I was using a chainsaw yesterday instead of practicing.

Classifiers are all about draws and reloads. Field course are about moving into and out of shooting positions. The shooting is the same--get your points. Movement is the key to winning in field courses while draws and reloads are key to moving up in the classifier system.

I have watched many a GM shoot a field course and they were breathing hard at the end of the course. They drove their legs a fast as they could in moving from one array to another.

I noticed I was just cruising along, not pushing my legs like them. The next aspect of their shooting was their ability to shoot accurately when breathing hard.

[Nik Habicht]

Always be shooting, always be moving.

And for the capacity limited divisions, add in always be reloading, if not shooting....

[eljay]

I'm a "resumer" - been away from the sport for a while, and I've just recently started up again. And I know there's a bunch of things I need to practice but I can only practice so many things in a session and I'm trying to focus on priorities. Ideally you would always focus on your worst skills, but most of us aren't that great at ruthlessly identifying our worst skill and focusing on that, especially when there's a lot of stuff that could use improvement. In a sense you could pick anything but you might as well pick something that's used a lot to start.

The classifiers only use a subset of the skills and they're important skills. So you get Steve's excellent book, and just focus on the first dozen drills. First priority - get your draws and reloads and transitions to a level where they're... OK. Just keep running the drills and not worrying about the other stuff too much at least to the point where the easy gains have been achieved.

At this point when you run a match the classifiers or classifier-like stages are probably fairly painless unless you're adding your own stress in, which is a different issue. And for the field courses you just treat them as a series of little classifiers - run, shoot an array, run, shoot an array. That'll do for now. But then you look at the standings and you see, oh, my rankings on these classifier-style stages are much lower than with these more involved stages. And you see that's not how the better shooters are doing it.

At this point you *could* keep training that subset of skills that are used in classifiers and watch your classification increase or you could start looking at field courses and start focusing on the additional skills used there. That might involve your own drills or looking past that first dozen drills in Steve's book. Not to say that you'll never practice draws and reloads again, but you remove it as a priority for a bit.

At some point your results on the field courses get back in line with your classifier-type stages and you can go back to this notion of focusing on your weakest skills and going from there (keeping in mind that your weakest skill might be the mental game or something else that's not obvious). It's a process. And for me I'm painfully aware that there are big chunks of the game I'm just flailing around on, but again, you have to start with something and those classifier skills are as good a place as any.

[Alaskapopo]

Points divided by time. Concentrate on having similar points as the top shooters, regardless of the time. The time will come later.

Is the speed going to automatically come?

I know for me accuracy came easy but speed was hard. I always found myself shooting in my comfort zone. Lately I have been really trying to push my speed and its paying off I just went up to B class in Open and Production. I think Making A class next will be an excersize in getting everything right as fast as possible.

Pat

[Sin-ster]

I have never had to shoot around a barricade, right and left, and through a tiny slit window from a shooting area that's more narrow than my normal stance. While conducting standing (gag me) reloads t'boot...

Except in a Classifier, of course...

That's a skill test, for sure-- but when we ever use that skill is beyond me. (Evil stage designers-- go!)

Some of the Classifiers are VERY good, however. On the Upper Pad II and Cash 'n Carry come to mind. I think the multi-box instances are also pretty pertinent as well.

PS-- Whoever set the HHF on some of these things... You are Gods. Freakishly balanced, narrow bodied Gods.