Doc's diary

[doc88]

Been shooting and competing a couple of years now so I decided I would start jotting a few thoughts down after dry fire and range sessions to keep up with thoughts. This year I have decided to push really hard and make some real progress. I wish I had pushed harder from the start.

At the range a couple of days ago my plan was to work on some transition drills at 15 yds. Targets 2 yds apart. My drills and goal times come from Stoeger's book. Goal times are those he set for GM's. I'm long ways from GM but I figure if I push for those goal times I'll get there quicker than if I just piddled along.

The Blake drill- get the grip and brake the first shot correctly to get started. Started by blazing through it but then went back to some better control to get better hits. Personally, performing the drill with decent control and THEN pushing up the anty did better. A couple of trigger freezes which I quickly corrected by consciously making myself grip tight with my weak hand and just use my trigger finger.

Also worked on head shots , SHO, WHO and 3 reload 3 on a plate rack at 25 yds. I have found, although many times quite frustrating that 25 yd plate rack work has helped my steel shooting at matches. Also has. 25 and. 50 yd group shooting and bill drills.

[ZackJones]

I can't go out to 25 yards on our plate rack but I get back as far as I can. It's quite challenging. What type of shooting do you do? If you shoot USPSA will you be shooting the SC Sectional match next month?

[doc88]

I shoot production and will be shooting the SC sectional. Just shot Area 6 and that was a great match.

[ZackJones]

Cool same here. I'm shooting on Friday and working Saturday though I don't know which stage I'm working on yet.

[doc88]

A couple of notes about SHO/WHO. One is I found shooting these at the 15yd or further distance helps when they show up on classifiers as most of the time the distance is shorter. Also visualizing the trigger finger pulling straight back to the rear of the trigger guard helped me if my trigger control got a little out of wack. I was able to push a little harder than I thought especially SHO and still get acceptable hits.

Shooting heads at 15yds. At first I struggled with what sight picture gave me the most accurate hits. Sounds crazy because align top of front sight with top and in center of rear sight is the combination. Since starting to use a fiber front sight in the last year and especially with my new production gun I have come to rely heavily on the fiber placement and shot placement. Works pretty well. I got much better, even alphas, on the heads at 15 yds using my fiber dot as my sight alignment reference. Granted the fiber dot is in the center of the rear sight but I guess my index is such that I am more consistent with this type of sight picture sight alignment. I don't know if I explained this very well but I know what I mean so that I can reference back to this diary when I begin to forget all that I learn. That's what happens when you get old.

A note about drill times. I use the GM goal times ad a reference for where I need to be. But since I'm just starting to use these drills I'll wait until another post or two to start worrying about times. Some of my times are close and some are not. My concern at this point is performing the drills correctly and seeing all I need to see in the sights to get the alphas. Also with it being several days since I shot I forgot my times. Guess I need to write them down or post as I'm shooting that day. Well this was just an "Ok I'm gonna start writing my range thoughts" thing so here I am. I'll get more specific I'm sure as I move along.

[doc88]

A few thoughts on yesterday 's match. RELAX dude. I seemed more uptight at this local club match than I did at Area 6. A couple of reasons (or excuses) are that I was coming off my best match ever at Area 6 and wanted a repeat. Another was I was putting a lot of pressure on my self to have a decent classifier. I did accomplish that at least. Overall I had a decent match time wise except for 4 mikes. Still shot 89% of points not including the the 40 pts worth of penalties. 96 A's 20 C's 1 D and 4 you know what's. They were all a result of rushing and not seeing what I needed to see. 3 of the 4 were SHO/WHO stages. Even though I practiced some this week on that it obviously was not enough. Th other was a hard cover hit I did not call. Too tense.

Two other issues on the day were stage planning issues. Lesson: just run the things from left to right in most instances. The other was a reload in the wrong place which cost me some time. Still 4th on that stage though.

Gotta get my brain right. I think 98% of my issues generally are mental. One thing I did for area 6 that I didn't do last week was I would dry fire mini stages and mentally break them down. Fully believe that helped me at area 6. Last couple of weeks it's been mostly classifier training. It worked too but just need to combine the two.

Oh well. Live and learn or shoot and learn. Hopefully writing these experiences down will improve the learning curve from here on.

[doc88]

Attended a class this weekend with a local GM. Very enlightening. Saturday consisted of a small stage then moved on to some fundamentals work. He recommended the following be done once a week: 7 yd and 25yd Bill drill, 30-50 yd group shooting, Blake drill, 4 aces and El Presidente.

Working on reloads he made the point that the time it takes to move between positions should be very similar with or without a reload.

On the subject of stage planning he recommended trying to predict your hit factor. Sometimes on long courses taking less points to make up time is more beneficial. Also time can be saved with fewer setup positions.

Finally, set a goal. Not just to move up in class or win a match but a specific goal such as a 2 second 4 aces or other drill. Hmmmm I'll have to think about that.

[ZackJones]

Who did you train with? I wouldn't mind spending some time with a GM to get better.

[doc88]

Live fire drills today with the following results.

Twos at 25 yds finally got in the 2 sec range. Was able to get a few 1.4 s draws with some mid .5-.6 splits.

25yd bill drill at 3.8 and 4.25 with only one C both times.

El Prez started out stupid fast with terrible hits then I realized from previous Blake drills that I could consistently shoot all A's in the .3 splits/transitions range. So I reigned it in and started getting better hits in the 6 sec range. Even shot an all alphas in 6.25 sec.

Group shooting went pretty well at 25, 30, and 50 yds. Once I really started watching the sight was able to put everything in the A box.

Lesson for the day: front sight and patience on it is a great tool. Knowing your abilities is also helpful. I think shooting twos and the Blake drill are wonderful learnt tools.

[doc88]

Lesson from SC Sectional...VISUAL PATIENCE

No excuse for pulling off a close target. One day I'll learn. Three out of 5 mikes were simply the lack visual patience. Two others were lack of skill. If, if , if. One day I hope to shoot a match without any if's.

[doc88]

Going back to Steve Anderson's dry fire book for a while and concentrate on transitions. Been in Stoeger's about 7 mos and no doubt it has improved my speed. Just need a little change of pace for a while. Anderson really concentrates on transitions and core classifier skills. However after using Stoeger's stuff a fee months I am definitely better on Anderson's drills than I was. I'm going to put a lot of emphasis on good transitions after that debacle at SC Sectional.

We'll see how it goes.

[doc88]

One thing to concentrate on is to burn a hole with my eyes exactly where I want my shots to go. The middle of the A zone not just brown. The middle of the steel plate not just a white circle. This is not as easy at it sounds .

[doc88]

What it did do though is help with my plate rack draws. I was able to run the pick 2 drill close to and even a few under 2 sec. Most were around 2.3-2.5 at 15 yds.

[Glock26Toter]

I think that if you are trying to burn in accuracy, stop timing yourself or worrying about time in practice. Just take a few practice sessions to shoot all A's (or plates) as quickly as you can.. or a better way to put it. Go as slow as you need to in order to get all A's. I did this with a buddy for a couple of training sessions and the next few matches resulted in 0 Mikes, and like 1-2 Deltas. It really helped to burn in "what an A looks like" and show you what you are after when trying for "visual patience."

Since we had 2 people we were able to time each other and write the times down. Then later, after practice we went over the results to see how our times were in order to get all A's. In our experience it was only a second or two... but seems like forever, you know.

[doc88]

What you are saying is absolutely correct. In fact my practices lately have been more about what it takes to shoot A's. However in an effort to push myself I sometimes get visually sloppy and just see brown paper or white plates. I'm trying to train my eyes to snap to the middle of the A zone or middle of the plate.

My last match was a test to myself to shoot as accurately as possible. It paid off too as I won production. However it was not without a flaw or two in my opinion and it always boiled down to visual patience.

Edited July 24, 2014 by doc88

[doc88]

Yesterday a buddy and I were running a couple of drills and low and behold we figured out just how to make them more difficult. Run them the opposite direction. First drill is the distance change up. Two seven yard targets with a 15 yd mini popper in the middle. Of course the goal is try to get your transition from the steel to the last target the same as your splits on your last target. We ran it left to right a few times no big deal. However running it right to left caused a multitude of misses on the steel. Very eye opening for both of us. Our eyes were just not use to snapping left. I had to slow down and consciously make myself snap left and stay on the steel until the shot fired. I also caught myself chasing the sight a couple of times.

At any rate we ran the drill several times right to left until we sort of got it. Just to test out selves we ran it a few times left to right reload right to left them the reverse as well. The great thing about the day was it made it into a very eye opening learning experience. I can think back to a couple of stages at the SC sectional that I miked on and all situations were right to left transitions. Sort of blew them off as lack of visual patience which is what they were but it was also lack of skill in right to left transitions.

[Glock26Toter]

Nice work. You need to practice that enough that the direction doesn't matter and can be decided on based on the best way to run the stage. Don't let something like a "favorite direction" add time to a run.

[doc88]

Nice work. You need to practice that enough that the direction doesn't matter and can be decided on based on the best way to run the stage. Don't let something like a "favorite direction" add time to a run.

Thanks for your input. I really appreciate it.

[doc88]

The other drill that day at the range was the accelerator. Accuracy running it from close to far was great. Times were in the high 6 to 7 range. Running the drill far to near was faster but suffered a couple of mikes every time on the 25yd target. Times in the high 5 to 6 range. We figured that the problem was the shots just after the reload on the 25 yd target. From there we spent done time doing the four aces drill on the 25yd target. That helped to settle us on that long target after a reloads. We reran the accelerator with much better results.

Conclusion is that accuracy is better when transitioning TO a far target but time is better when transitioning from far to near. At least now I know I something else to work on. Great thing about this practice session is that it went from being a hum drum drill session to a very eye opening and learning experience.

[doc88]

A little tidbit I picked up on yesterday dry firing four aces. Sounds like duh but you'll be surprised what you catch yourself doing. Trying to dry fire four aces in 2 sec but couldn't get it then I remembered about how a GM told me he reloads. Started bringing my gun back and down just far enough so I just had to move my eyes and not my head to see the magwell and boom my reloads just got quicker. Was able to consistently do the drill in 2 sec. If I didn't miss my reload altogether. Ha ha. It happens.

[doc88]

Thursday's live fire practice was horrible. I couldn't hit the side of a barn much less the 22 yd no shoot. Well I take that back. I hit the no shoot plenty just not the brown behind it. Misses on 12 yd steel. Just one of those days. Did some SH/WH and that was fumble fingers. Ended up on the plate rack pretty fair. Guess what ? Watch the sight and you'll get a lot farther.

Felt so bad I tried it a little more on Friday and steel was better but still had issues on the long no shoots. Made sure my gun was sighted in and it was. It was me.

Went to the match today and decided I'd better settle down , watch the front sight, and shoot accurately. Guess what it worked and actually had a pretty good match. Had one stupid no shoot hit on an 8 yd target. That's just me rushing. Didn't let that happen again though. Ended up winning production.

Lesson learned- if I hadn't had a bad practice and just took it all for granted I may not have settled myself down to just shot A's.

[doc88]

I think I really learned a lot this week from what was probably one of my worst practices ever and that is what it means to actually watch the front sight. It tells you every thing that is happening. Many of my mikes and no shoot hits are because of not staying with the front sight long enough. I shot 93.5% of points without penalties and 90.6% with penalties this weekend. All because "most of the time" I paid close attention to my front sight. I can't be any faster than I am at this very moment but I can GET faster. What's most important at match time is to stay with the front sight.

At least thats how I see it for now. Anyone who sees it differently please let me know.

Edited August 3, 2014 by doc88

[Glock26Toter]

it's just like anything else Doc. First you have to learn it, then after you've been doing it for a while you can get faster and faster. I've been going through the same thing. Trying to see my Alphas and then worrying about speed. I've reduced my mikes to almost nothing and it's a big deal now when I get a Delta. I've noticed since I've been doing that my times have only dropped slightly. Only now do I feel like it's time to start trying to speed up the Alpha getting.. but for a while there it was just "get them. Don't waste any time, but get them. "

I still haven't started doing any timing during practice... that's for A's.

[doc88]

Thanks for your interest G26. It's a fun road to travel.

Every now and then I run into a little reload slump where I start missing them on quick classifier drills both dry and live fire. Pretty crappy yesterday in live fire and this morning in dry fire. Doesn't help when you got the problems of work on your mind either. Anyway came home today and tried it again with some el prez and 4 aces dry fire drills and sure enough was missing them again. Then low and behold I remembered a little trick I had heard from a few higher ups that suggest a very slight pause just before entering the magwell. Every thing just came together. Dry fired the el prez in less than 4 sec and the 2 aces in 2 sec. Was able to pull of some single reloads in the. .9 range.

I love the problem solving of this game. Adds a little to the confidence level when you can pull it together too.

[doc88]

Live fire today consisted of 4 aces at 7 yds and 25 yds. Man you need to relax to do this right. Best at 7 yds with all A's was about 2.7 sec. Best at 25 yds was 4.7 sec with one C.

Best part of the day was group shooting at 25, 35, and 50yds. Learned a lot from that. Twenty-five to 35 yds was pretty much POA/POI. Fifty yards a little different. However it actually worked out well. My bullets shoot a little low at 50 yds so if I aligned the sight just under the head of the target it would pretty much hit mid A. Now I need to practice that with an IPSC target.

Love the learning part of all this.