Gooldylocks Posted February 14, 2014 Share Posted February 14, 2014 Well I figured I would start a range diary. I just started shooting this game a few months ago (November) and have gotten hooked. I just signed up for my first year's membership with USPSA today! I want to just use this thread to hold myself a bit more accountable to my training and things. At this point I have no real dry or live fire training schedule, but I hope to start building one. I was reading Nimitz's diary and he seems to have a good schedule, so I might try to model after that. So here are my goals for this year: 1: Stick to a dedicated training program and keep at it consistently. 2: Figure out what kind of equipment I want to use/ the setup of that equipment (this includes division, I still can't decide if I want to shoot production or Lim, though I am leaning towards limited) 3: Be classed and shooting as a mid to upper B by the end of the year. 4: Buy some of those books everyone talks about and implement them in my practice. 5: Shoot a lot. That's all I got for now, I guess it's time for a little dry fire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hi-Power Jack Posted February 14, 2014 Share Posted February 14, 2014 Wish I could commit myself to a POA. I wish you luck in implementing the plan, and attaining your goal of B+ ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJE Posted February 14, 2014 Share Posted February 14, 2014 I also started USPSA in November, so we are close to the same boat. I have two of Ben Stoeger's books and I would recommend them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 14, 2014 Author Share Posted February 14, 2014 (edited) The classifiers I have shot so far and my hit factor/time for them: Steely Speed VII: 4.3605 6.88 Can You Count: 3.3967 14.72 PENATLY 50 Bookout's Boogie: 1.3905 17.26 Too Close For Comfort: 4.6557 10.31 As anyone can see I botched a couple of those realllllly bad. Bookout's Boogie was at the very first match I shot (November '13) Edited February 14, 2014 by Gooldylocks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 14, 2014 Author Share Posted February 14, 2014 I also started USPSA in November, so we are close to the same boat. I have two of Ben Stoeger's books and I would recommend them. Cool to hear someone else is at the same place I am! Those were some of the ones I was most interested in actually. I want a fairly laid out training plan. I am not so good at being self motivated for things like this, so I like to have a schedule to stick too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 15, 2014 Author Share Posted February 15, 2014 Well first day of running some live fire drills since I started my diary. Got to the range and it wasn't raining, but as soon as we started setting up the targets it started pouring. Decided to push on anyway. Started with a couple reps of El Prez. Couldn't get the reload very good, I really need to work on my dry fire reloads more. I think the wet hands wasn't helping either. Shot a few reps of Accelerator. That was the first time I had done that one, and it was interesting to see/hear. I shot it better going from close to far, so I practiced a couple more going from far to close. I didn't have a very good sight picture on the far target when I would try to speed it up, I need to practice seeing my front sight before I pull the trigger. Did a few Bill drills, with my best time around 3.2. I had a several splits down around .18 or .19, but my draw is crap. My average draw was like 1.9. I am not so good at that at all. MOAR DRYFIRE Finished up with a couple more El Prez runs and Vice Prez runs before we decided to run away from the rain. THINGS TO FIX: My timer wasn't working very good, and my hammer kept failing to reset so I would have to take a double action pull in the middle of a string of fire. Not good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chills1994 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 The classifiers I have shot so far and my hit factor/time for them: Steely Speed VII: 4.3605 6.88 Can You Count: 3.3967 14.72 PENATLY 50 Bookout's Boogie: 1.3905 17.26 Too Close For Comfort: 4.6557 10.31 As anyone can see I botched a couple of those realllllly bad. Bookout's Boogie was at the very first match I shot (November '13) Have you run these through the online classifier calculators: http://cmcalc.com/ Or http://classifiercalc.com/ Typically, your first run on the classifier at a local match counts for match score. You can check with your Match Director, but you should be able to re-shoot the classifier because of "brain farts" or "gun malfunctions". Then the MD submits your best score to USPSA HQ. As far as timers go, there are two smart phone apps. One is by Surefire. The other is by Innovative Applications (IA). Not that there is convienent way to clip your smart phone on your pocket or belt without having it exposed to the weather. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 17, 2014 Author Share Posted February 17, 2014 Decided to borrow my friend's G22 to see if I can get used to the grip angle and work on some dry fire in preparation for this weekend's match. I want to try one out and see if shooting major power factor makes a significant difference to my points. After just a short bit of practice with it, I am already nailing reloads around a second, with some down to .8. This of course doesn't include the next shot, but I did have a decent sight picture on the target. I am thinking that I might get a 35 and try it out. Since it seems to be the cheapest way to get into shooting limited effectively. I added up all the parts and pieces and I think I can build one for around 750. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 18, 2014 Author Share Posted February 18, 2014 Well it looks like I won't be able to shoot the match this weekend, but I have continued to do some dry fire practice with my buddy's G22, and it feels good. Really good. I think I will be moving in the glock direction. Was running El Prez in the living room dry fire, and had the par timer set for 6.5. Was doing pretty good there so I tried 6, with pretty poor success. Need to get to the range and try it out to see where I am at, since the biggest issue for me is the reload with my other gun ( I can't reach the magazine release without breaking my grip, whereas with the Glock I can). This has made my reloads way faster and more consistent. Need to work up a 40 load, hopefully one of the ones on here works good for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 19, 2014 Author Share Posted February 19, 2014 Made two loads for .40 cal yesterday. First one went minor in a G22, average velocity ~910. Second went major, ~950. Need to try it out in my 35 when it gets here to see if I can make major with the first load. Been dry firing a lot with this borrowed Glock. Been trying some different drills (the ones found on Ben Stoeger's site) and seeing some improvement. It is nice to have the Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced par times on there. I think I will probably buy his book. I have made it a habit to do some simple draws and reloads for par (going for about .9 on my reloads and 1.4ish draws/first shot) before doing some other drills. I printed 1/6th targets and have them set up so I can do the Mover Sequence drill. Current time is about 5.8. Need to learn/practice driving the gun harder from target to target, and pick up the front sight faster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 24, 2014 Author Share Posted February 24, 2014 Its like Christmas in February! While I was gone skiing all weekend, my Dawson mag extensions got here as well as my G35 (will pick it up tomorrow), and my first classification card! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted February 26, 2014 Author Share Posted February 26, 2014 Shot four different .40 cal loads through my new G35. Two loaded with Bullseye and two loaded with IMR 700X. Did some dry fire practice of Close 90 Close. Par time was 3 seconds. 10 reps left to right and 10 right to left. Reallllly need to work on my draw speed and reloads with this new gun. Then I worked on Mover Sequence, par time was 5.4 seconds. Finished up with reloads. Par was 1.2. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 4, 2014 Author Share Posted March 4, 2014 Well I am going to be shooting the match this weekend. So hopefully that goes well. I haven't been dry firing nearly as much as I should be. I loaded up 200 rounds of .40 tonight, so I am gonna be ready to go this weekend. I went to the range today and just shot at the plate rack and did reloads (2 plates, reload, 2 plates, reload, 2 plates). My reloads were going okay, but I need to practice a bunch before saturday that's for sure. During dryfire I was doing very poorly at my reloads. For some reason or another I kept getting the magazines in the magwell kind of crooked and they would hang up about halfway in the gun. I don't know why it was happening, but I know the reason was that I was coming in too angled (not straight on to the grip) and catching the back side of the gun and it was binding. Interestingly though when I would close my eyes and not watch the magazine into the gun I would nail my reloads.... very strange... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZackJones Posted March 4, 2014 Share Posted March 4, 2014 A few ideas for your reloads: 1 - Try canting the pistol about 45 degrees to the right as you are inserting the magazine 2 - Watch the magazine all the way into the mag well. You may be able to spot something that's causing the twist 3 - Video tape yourself reloading. You'll be amazed at things you can spot playing the video back that you didn't realize you're doing. 4 - How high up are you holding the pistol? Perhaps holding it a little higher so you can watch what's going one will help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 5, 2014 Author Share Posted March 5, 2014 A few ideas for your reloads: 1 - Try canting the pistol about 45 degrees to the right as you are inserting the magazine 2 - Watch the magazine all the way into the mag well. You may be able to spot something that's causing the twist 3 - Video tape yourself reloading. You'll be amazed at things you can spot playing the video back that you didn't realize you're doing. 4 - How high up are you holding the pistol? Perhaps holding it a little higher so you can watch what's going one will help. I shot some video today that I can edit real quick and post so you can see. It's GoPro, so kinda far away but it works. From what my unexperienced eyes can see: 1: I think I do 2: I don't see what is causing the twist, although it could potentially be that my wrist isn't straight with my arm? I generally pick up the mag when it enters my peripheral, I don't look down (should I be?) 4: Gun is approximately chin level, maybe a touch below? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 5, 2014 Author Share Posted March 5, 2014 So here is a video of my reloads from this morning. A few good ones mixed in with a bunch of bad ones. Do you guys see what I am doing (or not doing) that is causing these to be so bad? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverBolt Posted March 5, 2014 Share Posted March 5, 2014 Looks like your mag pouches are vertical? If you can adjust the first two mag pouches closest to the front at about a 45 degree angle to the left. It will help you get your index finger along the front of the mag and index the mag into the well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 5, 2014 Author Share Posted March 5, 2014 My new pouches that will be able to adjust for angle should get here today. Then I will try setting them up like that. For now my pouches are just vertical. I think that is part of the problem though, that I get my wrist angled all wrong grabbing the magazines. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJE Posted March 6, 2014 Share Posted March 6, 2014 Its like Christmas in February! While I was gone skiing all weekend, my Dawson mag extensions got here as well as my G35 (will pick it up tomorrow), and my first classification card! Mine still looks like that too. Local club is doing a classifier match next weekend, but the classifiers won't be on until April. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJE Posted March 6, 2014 Share Posted March 6, 2014 So here is a video of my reloads from this morning. A few good ones mixed in with a bunch of bad ones. Do you guys see what I am doing (or not doing) that is causing these to be so bad? It helps me to bring the gun back in a little more than you're doing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZackJones Posted March 6, 2014 Share Posted March 6, 2014 You might want to post this in the video critique area. You'll probably get lots of feedback there. A couple of points: 1 - Each time you have a bad reload it looks like the front of the magazine is hitting the front of the magwell. 2 - It appears your eyes are focused on the magwell. Just for grins try focusing on the magazine and see if that makes any difference. 3 - It's easy to get frustrated when you fumble a reload but don't give up on it. Correct the problem and complete the reload. We all fumble magazines and if you do it during a match you have to recover as quickly as you can. 4 - When everything goes right you're fast. Keep at it man. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 6, 2014 Author Share Posted March 6, 2014 I will do all those things. I know especially with the getting frustrated part, thats a huge issue for me. Thanks a lot Zach do the help! I will post it there and see what happens. Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 8, 2014 Author Share Posted March 8, 2014 I went shooting today just for fun and it was great. The weather was gorgeous, the sun was shining, and it seemed like a great day to bring out my Henry, my Blackhawk, and my dad's .22 just for some plinking. Pop cans and clay pigeons, it was a great day. I'm super excited for tomorrow's match, we will see how I do with my new setup. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gooldylocks Posted March 9, 2014 Author Share Posted March 9, 2014 Woot woot! 1st place unclassified limited, 5th limited overall! I love my new gun! Good: My reloads and transitions and stuff were good. Was able to get all six shots off on Light in and Thunder. Footwork felt solid. Bad: poor shot calling. Lost a second to second and a half on one stage by going back to a target instead of making it up immediately. Super fun match, I had the most fun I think I have ever had. Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJE Posted March 9, 2014 Share Posted March 9, 2014 Good job! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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