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Which is Harder - Overcoming Gobbling or Making GM?


Esther

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Stay positive remember the good things and quickly forget any bad/negative things. When you go to a match people will try to help even if you don't ask for help. Shooters are mainly good helpful people. We all wish the best for you. You can..

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Wow, you guys are so amazing! Thank you soo much! :D

Thanks Donovan! That sounds right. And is exactly the kind of kick in the butt I need (and started an online range journal for). Bill, same goes for you. :-)

dfwmiket - lol I was going to say the same thing dravz did. But I appreciate the meaning!

daves_not_here and pointofimpact - I know that most USPSA shooters jump into their first competition and have a great time from there. However, I want to learn the most that I can from my first competition, and I know that if I shot my first match tomorrow, I'd waste a lot of time, attention, and ammo during the experience botching my mag changes, draws, etc. I want my basic gun-handling to at least be competent so that I can focus on the shooting and pick up what I don't know (and need to improve going forward).

In other words, I have so many basic weak or nonexistent skills that I don't need match experience to know I need to work on.

Steve - That's the plan, to practice those skills in dry-fire. :)

Flex - That's a very interesting observation about personalities in the sport that exhibit compulsive behaviors. Do you mean compulsive with respect to training and competing, or unhealthy behaviors (e.g., addictions, nail-biting, etc.), or both? Do you think they are more common in our sport than in other sports or activities, and if yes, why?

Chris iliff - Yeah, I pretty much flipped out when I saw so many GMs (including Bill, who is pretty much an honorary GM) coming out of the woodwork. Thanks for the book suggestion and encouragement! :D

Edited by Esther
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(OK, so the old biochem/genetics side of me thinks the compulsive eating could have a physiological problem, but I'm sure you already have people trying to figure that out.)

I suspect you could channel the OCD into shooting compulsions, which should aid your ability.

Its actually pretty rare for most athletes to be that limited by their genetic potential - and I've yet to see any GM moving at a level that would require genetic ability in addition to dedication.

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First off, good for you on your eating disorder. Few realize that it's more than an issue of willpower and involves some major work and soul-searching (I've been there).

If you come out to Richmond (www.richmondhotshots.com), I know that you'll get more help than you can shake a stick at, particularly if you make it known to your squad that you'd love input.

But before your first match, there's an Intro to IPSC course that's worth taking (scroll all the way down on the page I linked to above for some info; more info here: http://www.richmondhotshots.com/intro_to_ipsc.html) This is the book they want you to have gone through: http://www.richmondhotshots.com/docs/SafeHandgunCompetitor_Rev2.0.pdf

Feel free to get in touch if you want some (relatively) local support.

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I really want to gobble, I am too tired to dry-fire (Steve, I do not want to hear a comment about how one can never be too tired to dry-fire! :P ), so I am going to post about what I did in shooting today.

Actually, I am going to copy and paste. But first I will explain the source.

Several months ago, after a particularly awful series of mega gobbles*, I asked my good friend Rebecca if she could do me a favor. I asked if each night, I could send her a short email of 3-5 things that I am thankful for that day. I said that I spent so much of my time fixated on (what I perceived to be) my lacks, worrying about the future, or feeling sick, stuffed, drugged, and frustrated from gobbling that I missed a lot of the very good things happening around me every day.

Rebecca said she thought that was a great idea, and that she wanted to send me her thankful list every night as well!

At first I was really inept at coming up with thankful items. It would take me half an hour of sitting on the couch before I could think of five things that I was thankful for that day, and they would often be lame items, like, "I ate a tasty sandwich." (Of course I could default to things like existence, but that was a cheap trick because the point of the exercise was to come up with uniquely positive things about that day.)

But pretty soon, within a week or so, I found myself keeping an eye out for thankful items that I could report to my friend. And creating opportunities for things I could be thankful for.

Well, here are the items from tonight's thankful list that pertain to shooting (in chronological order not in order of how thankful I am for them):

1) getting so many encouraging and supportive comments after posting my first range diary entry, including ones from Ben Stoeger (current Production National Champion), Steve Anderson, Kyle Farris, all GMs. I am pretty floored.

2) shooting at Reed's. I had originally been planning to shoot mostly .22's since I am all out of factory reload 9's and am paying regular prices. I started off doing random beep - torso shot - head shot with the .22 and shot terribly. I've been handling my CZ at home more, and as a result (I think), the m&p's weight, grip, and trigger all feel funny. My index was off, my sights came up misaligned, and I kept pulling the trigger left and right.

I switched to the CZ, and immediately everything felt much better. I could tell from my grip that my sights were (mostly) aligned where I looked, and pulling the trigger felt really natural. I also noticed something interesting - when transitioning from the torso to the head A shot, I felt like I was "riding" the recoil of the gun to the follow-up shot, and they all turned out really accurate (unlike my .22 shots, my CZ head shots all showed up in a nice small clump right of dead center in the upper A zone).

I don't often get to practice transitions in live-fire (though, I am sure if I am creative I can come up with some good drills even in a single lane at up to 25 yards), but it's something I've noticed while shooting plate racks too, that the momentum from the recoil of one shot helps to transition your gun to the second/next shot.

5) the shooting community and especially the people on brianenos.com. I know I say this all the time, but shooters as a group are the nicest and most helpful people ever :-D

Goodnight! :)

* Gobbles come in different sizes, and mega gobbles are the biggest.

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I don't often get to practice transitions in live-fire (though, I am sure if I am creative I can come up with some good drills even in a single lane at up to 25 yards), but it's something I've noticed while shooting plate racks too, that the momentum from the recoil of one shot helps to transition your gun to the second/next shot.

Good morning E-

Try this at the indoor range:

Shoot two different areas of the same target i.e. two dots/pasters (I use blue painter's masking tape - about a 2" square) on either side of the hanging paper target. Even at 5-7 yards, it's not a big transition on a single lane/target arrangement, but it does somewhat simulate the transition bet ween two stacked targets which you will definitely see in a live range practice or match.

The goal is to place each shot on the dot/paster/tape. You can vary the exercise: one shot each dot, two on one, etc... and the accuracy requirement should keep you on the good side of any indoor rapid fire restriction.

Edited by lumpygravy
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Aglifter - Yes and yes. :) Compulsive behaviors are very multi-faceted monsters. There are biochemical and cultural and personal factors. Everyone is different.

What is really interesting to me is how certain disorders manifest in specific cultures at specific times. As a historical example - because it is easier to see quirks in cultures from other times and places - female hysteria was a very prevalent "illness" among upper-class Victorian women during Freud's time, but is practically unknown today. Looking back, we can see clearly that many of the symptoms of hysteria (fainting, nervousness, shortness of breath) as reactions to the stifled lives that women then were forced to lead.

From what I've read, addictions (to food, drugs, alcohol, sex, the Internet :) / ;) ) are a modern phenomenon. People were addicted to substances before, of course, but we don't see the widespread occurrence of and recognition of addiction as a way of life (albeit a dysfunctional one). My guess is that the prevalence of addiction has to do with an emptiness of purpose and community... If I'm right, that would help explain why shooting is such a powerful antidote to gobbling.

diehli -

First off, good for you on your eating disorder. Few realize that it's more than an issue of willpower and involves some major work and soul-searching (I've been there).

Thanks for understanding about that! :) Jon's beat you to giving me the info about the Intro to IPSC class. And I'm hoping to come out to the Richmond practice next weekend, so hopefully I will see you there!

Jon - Thanks for the suggestion! I'll try it the next time.

Shooting items from tonight's thankful email:

2) dry-firing and practicing mag changes. Actually, I'm not happy with how I continue to have trouble hitting the mag release, so I just rotated the gun over and over in my right hand hitting the release and getting the mag to drop vertically.

I also figured out why it's harder for me to drop a mag when moving left than right. When I move right, inertia makes the gun's muzzle turn left, towards the center of my body (it's the same effect as when your car accelerates forward, and you feel slammed backward into your seat). Whereas when I move left, inertia makes the gun move right in relation to me, away from my body. Anyway I need to be equally good at changing mags no matter which direction I'm moving, but that was kind of cool to figure out.

Edited by Esther
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Alphamikefoxtrot - Making GM is not the most aerobic undertaking, but I'm guessing that upper body strength matters, especially in controlling recoil, so I will have to work extra hard at that.

One more shooting-related thankful item:

5) that I can appreciate and/or create beauty in music, literature, painting, art. I think I am more artistic than the typical shooter and more badass than the typical artist. It is a nice spot in the Venn diagram to be. :-)

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Hi-Power Jack -- You might be right about GM being unattainable for most people, or for most women, or for me in particular, but the only way for me to find out is to assume it's possible and try. At the least, I will have fun, learn something, and make great friends in the process. :)

I love your enthusiasm. There is a lot of good stuff here, so my comment would be to quote Henry Ford -

"Whether you think you can, or you think you can't--you're right.”

(PS- Arm and wrist strength is important to recoil control, I would recommend a hand trainer like COC (Captains of Crush) and Industrial strength rubber bands for strengthening your hands.)

Edited by GuildSF4
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You take care, young lady-we're here for you. One of the great things about shooting is that you're always competing with yourself in the end. So you can set mini-goals for each match, and come out a winner even if you're not at the top of the standings.

I think the intro to IPSC course is a great idea; you can get some concentrated trigger time, and work on some of the skills you mentioned. Can't say enough about dry fire parctice for all of the handling skills.

I'll send you some exercises you can practice at the range on one target, that work on transitions.

Still fooling around with that Safariland holster I bought for my CZ; I'm thinking it's a keeper. I'll send you more detailed comments later.

Tim

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GuildSF54 - That's a great quote. And, thanks for the suggestions about grip strength!

Tim - Thanks! I'm really touched by your support, and that of everyone here. :) Send me the target transitions exercises when you get a chance!

Shooting items from last night's thankful email:

1) having a good conversation with Jeremy last night. He asked whether my current level of effort is consistent with my goals. I honestly answered that clearly it is not...

I think an important thing for me to find is the right balance between thinking something is hard and not hard. Maybe I'm a lot lazier than Jeremy is, or our approaches are just different, but I don't find it helpful to dwell on how much hard work something will take. It helps me to realize how much effort and commitment is required, but then I need to forget it, too, to find my intrinsic motivation in the moment.

Jeremy said, "You want to be the best in the world," and I said, "No, I just want to make GM (at least for now)." And he pointed out, "But that would make you the best female shooter in the world right? Even the top women shooters who do it professionally haven't been able to make it."

I try not to think of it in terms of being a great female shooter, but it was helpful to realize just how ambitious my goal is. I see examples left and right on the forums of people who make it to GM through hard work, and they're just regular guys who love to shoot, and they work at it a few hours a day, and they do it. They're not super athletes who run sprints, lift heavy weights, dry-fire two hours every day, and burn through 1,000 rounds a week. So I tend to think making GM is hard but doable, like learning to walk on your hands.

But Jeremy's point about how there have never been any female GMs thus far made me realize, okay, maybe this will take a little more work than I thought.

Another thing I realized is that even though I know how to excel at mental pursuits, I know very little about training my body to perform certain skills. I had assumed without realizing it* that a lot of the habits that make for a good artist translate to sports, but that is not necessarily the case. As Jeremy said: "You need to burn movements/actions into your subconscious. It's different. It's not purely mental like the things you are used to doing."

4) getting helpful responses to questions about shooting from Donovan and Bo

5) figuring out a way to shift my gun in my shooting hand without relying on momentum. Jeremy said to start from what I want to accomplish and work backwards. So I pressed my thumb to the bottom of the mag release, dropped a mag vertically, and shifted my hand back to a normal grip, and figured out what the motion is like.

Of course now I am back at square one and super slow again, but I think this will be much better in the long run. When I was flipping my gun with more momentum, the mag would fall vertically most of the time but not always, and I didn't feel as in control of the gun during the motion. Now I do whether I am moving left or right or forwards or backwards.

* One might say this is the definition of an assumption. :-)

Edited by Esther
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"But that would make you the best female shooter in the world right? Even the top women shooters who do it professionally haven't been able to make it."

Running a mile under 4 minutes was considered by many to be impossible until it was done, and in the next 10 years the record was broken 5 times. ;)

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There will always be disparities between our goals and reality. They wouldn't be goals otherwise.

The real question is "How far away are you and do you have a map to get there?"

With a map you'll have an idea of your journey.

Lanny Basham says in his book "With Winning In Mind" If you change goals consider the first one as having completed it's purpose. Also, make sure you trade up in goals rather than trade down.

Also, if you want to be a GM track one down in your area. There are a lot less honorable things to work towards in your spare time.

DNH

Edited by daves_not_here
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Chris - Thanks! :)

GuildSF4 - I've thought the exact same thing about sub 4 miles. I think it's just a matter of time before we see a female GM in Open; it might take a little longer in Production where you have to physically do all of the work that an Open gun does for you, but it will happen. I honestly care very little whether I make GM first or second or fourth or nine hundredth as a female; I just want to do it. :-)

daves_not_here - Not revising my goal, just revising my estimate of how much effort it will take. :) But that's an excellent point that the value in an initial goal, question, product idea, etc., is often in the further goal, question, idea that it leads to.

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Flex - That's a very interesting observation about personalities in the sport that exhibit compulsive behaviors. Do you mean compulsive with respect to training and competing, or unhealthy behaviors (e.g., addictions, nail-biting, etc.), or both? Do you think they are more common in our sport than in other sports or activities, and if yes, why?

Both, or neither... I think many have tendencies to do things in a somewhat excessive manner. That doesn't have to be good or bad. I don't want to label it as such. I don't believe it's good or bad. It is just a personality trait. (Hell, how many times did Edison try to make a light bulb?)

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I am starting to read Steve Anderson's book, and the mental stuff is really interesting. He said that for two years, he would always miss 1 or 2 plates when shooting at 20 yds. He would never miss 5 or 6, just 1 or 2. And he realized that he had this mental image of himself where he expected to miss 1 or 2, even though he wanted to hit all 6. How he expected to perform was more important to his actual performance than how he wanted to perform.

In fact, he had gotten so used to the image of himself as a shooter who missed 1-2 plates at 20 yds that not missing any made him feel uncomfortable.

I resonated with that, not just for shooting but for gobbling. I really want not to gobble, I try my hardest to not gobble (just like Steve really wanted and was trying his hardest to hit all 6 plates). But I think of myself who is more likely to feel defeated and clobbered in the morning than someone who feels gobbly, doesn't gobble, and puts $5 in her jar as a matter of course.*

And, for those of you who've recommended Lanny Bassham's books - thanks! With Winning in Mind is on the way via Amazon Prime!

Tonight's thankful items that pertain to shooting:

2) running 2 miles of .25 mile repeats at 6 minute mile pace -- I am really out of shape! But I did it!

3) doing a bunch of slow, smooth reps of my new new mag change technique with no par timer while looking in the mirror. And some SHO WHO dry-fire.

4) cleaning my guns

* I put $5 in a jar for every day that I don't gobble. Originally I was planning to save up for an evening gown, but now I am thinking of using the money to buy a reload press (because how will a gown help in a home invasion?! ;) ).

Edited by Esther
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You'll love Lanny Bassham's book. Positive self image is really important in shooting, and he describes it in a way that's easy to get... it's "like Esther" to shoot a 100% classifier at any match. A pretty powerful idea I think.

Edited by bill o
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Donovan - Yeah, I've pretty much decided to save up for the reload press. In retrospect, was the primary value of the reload press in ammo savings (thus allowing you to shoot more) or in customized loads?

Today's thankful item:

2) running 4 easy miles and squeezing in 20 min of dry-fire even though I had a super busy day

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Donovan - Yeah, I've pretty much decided to save up for the reload press. In retrospect, was the primary value of the reload press in ammo savings (thus allowing you to shoot more) or in customized loads?

Today's thankful item:

2) running 4 easy miles and squeezing in 20 min of dry-fire even though I had a super busy day

Both.

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Just don't forget, this is supposed to be fun..... ;)

Totally. That's part of why I like Ben's dryfire book so much. It takes dryfire from a rote, mechanical, boring task to something that is really fun and challenging, and actually simulates match conditions to a degree. And let's not forget, it's the matches that are the fun part.

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