Camo Cowboy's performance analysis journal

[Glock26Toter]

I just got back from another USPSA Nationals.  While my performance was littered with mistakes and some mediocre performance there were more good things than bad and this was my best showing yet.  It was a strange one indeed and while hurricane Matthew turned out to be a major non-issue for us it changed the match in a big way.  We wound up shooting a 2 day, full schedule and taking Friday completely off.  Friday's worst wind was completely normal for some of the Eastern Colorado's wind in a local match and it only rained about 1/2 the day.  

At any rate, here's a link to a complete video of my match.  Spencer Stein did an awesome job of capturing all my runs.    

So there were plenty of mistakes, but overall I wound up with 1 Noshoot, 5 mikes, and 14 deltas.  My proudest moment was the barricade one with some brutal one hand shooting.  I managed to get through that stage with all my hits and did it in a completely reasonable time.  This netted me a 4th place overall finish on that stage among some big-dog names.  My final place was 26th Open.  In Grandmaster class that was 21 out of 34 GM's that showed.  

I was very disappointed to discover that despite my best efforts my C-More had drifted about 4" right at 25 yards.  This spelled disaster for the 50 yard shooting challenge where I successfully called all my hits, but took 2 mikes and a delta.  When I shot yet another mike on the next 30 yard head shot I realized that the first hit on every mike was on the right side of the target.  I ran down to the function range, confirmed the issue and fixed it.   

That was at the very end of the first day so I went into day 2 with a renewed attitude and had a great time. 

After reviewing all my videos I see some good things to not, and some areas for improvement that I can work with.

Good:

I showed myself some amazing accuracy and visual patience.  In plenty of instances I not only waited for the dot to settle as required, but made the decision to accept a charlie or wait for the alpha successfully.  I showed myself I can do that.  I also didn't blow a single reload.  I didn't have to think about those things or concentrate on them... they just happened while I shot. 

Areas for improvement:

To contrast the above, I was reminded how easily one can forget the visual patience thing and miss some calls that I had no business missing.  My 1 noshoot was on the closest noshoot in the entire match.  It was like, 6 feet in front of me and I plugged it like a chump!  I was in full on "make up mode" from a previous screw up.  I need to remember that no matter what, when I'm shooting, I'M ONLY SHOOTING.  I have no choice but to wait for the required sight picture... I know what it looks like.  Just do it, all the time. 

I can see that I have a "plant step" when moving out of many positions.  My trailing foot lifts slightly before planting and I think this is from not having my weight prepared properly for leaving.  I'll work on this to see if there's a way to already have my trailing leg loaded for launching out of position better.  If not, see if there's a way to capitalize on that "plant" or "spring" step to get out of positions faster.  A tad more research into this is needed. 

I'm doing much better on keeping my elbow up on reloads and need to do the same with surrender position draws.  On the stage where I dot hunted for an eternity I can see that my shoulder drops quite a bit causing a hunch-draw situation.  I've been burned on that before where allowing my upper body to move will cause me to draw at an angle hanging the gun up in the holster.  I need to practice making the surrender draw without moving anything else on my upper body so that it's exactly the same as my normal draw.

 

[Richc2048]

Congrats Cowboy! You did great boss!

[d_striker]

Is it normal for C-Mores to not hold their zero like you're seeing?

[Glock26Toter]

I've talked to several people that have experienced the same thing.  I think It's just a matter of how often you check and how tolerant you are.   Back when I first started I thought that within 3"-4" at 25 yards was "good enough." and it was off by about that much each time I checked.  If I only checked it every 6 months, then it was only off every 6 months. 

Only now that I'm not willing to accept a drift of 3"-4" do I "see the problem."  Only now that I check every week do I realize that it's off every week.  Sometimes it's not, but normally it's off after every match.

The question that bothers me is.... is it off after the first shot, or the 100th shot?  Not knowing where I stand is not something I'm willing to put up with anymore.  Given my current experience and ability I feel the need to solve this problem.  I think the solution is a Deltapoint.  I've seen that super shiny, super crisp dot of the Deltapoint and I want it bad.    

Having said all that, let's keep in mind that if we go to C-More about this issue they'll likely say it's not on every sight.  Furthermore it's probably a result of mounting it sideways. Not to mention my experience is with exactly THREE sights.  Not something to draw a complete conclusion from.  So my statements about C-More are NOT a statement on their product quality.  

If you have one, check it often and maintain it just like all your equipment. 

[CHA-LEE]

I think that the C-More drift is more a product of the materials its constructed with along with how its adjusted. The C-More is designed so that the plastic frame is tweaked into position to change its zero. Plastic is not the best medium for being bent and then retaining that new position, especially when its exposed to a wide range of temperatures and high G-force shock events. Not to mention the weight of the gun laying on the sight in strange angles while its bagged or transported to and from the range.

I would assume that an Aluminum body C-More would be less prone to drifting its zero as aluminum is a lot less pliable or temperature sensitive than plastic. But it would still need to handle the high G-force shock events that happen during every shot which may lead to different types of sight alignment errors.

More and more Open shooters are converting to the RTS or Delta Point Pro style sights. Maybe its time for the C-More to ride off into the sunset?

[d_striker]

I'm not looking forward to the cmore that's coming with my gun. No amount of zero shift is acceptable to me. 

[Sarge]

16 minutes ago, d_striker said:

I'm not looking forward to the cmore that's coming with my gun. No amount of zero shift is acceptable to me. 

I have two that have never ever drifted once set.

[drewbeck]

My Cmore never shifted on me either.  I switched to DPP but it wasn't because the sight didnt keep its zero.  

 

I agree the design and materials are interesting and think it's actually pretty impressive they are as good as they are considering their cost is likely about 7 bucks after the mold cost was recuperated.  I think the set screw has a lot to do with how any individual sight maintains it's zero. If the set screw wants to settle in a different place than you last zeroed it, I think the recoil will allow it to clock back to its preferred place which takes it out of zero.  

 

Who knows, 

[drewbeck]

My Cmore never shifted on me either.  I switched to DPP but it wasn't because the sight didnt keep its zero.  

 

I agree the design and materials are interesting and think it's actually pretty impressive they are as good as they are considering their cost is likely about 7 bucks after the mold cost was recuperated.  I think the set screw has a lot to do with how any individual sight maintains it's zero. If the set screw wants to settle in a different place than you last zeroed it, I think the recoil will allow it to clock back to its preferred place which takes it out of zero.  

 

Who knows, 

[DocMedic]

When I was shooting Open exclusively I would have to check my DOT just before every major match. I have had my dot drift two times that I can remember, but I always chalked it up to a couple things, either I would be using different primers then before or a different brand of bullet. But I only really noticed it when I went to a side mount Cmore. If I decide to go back into open I'll be putting a RTS sight on the open gun and reserving the old Cmore to a .22

[Glock26Toter]

I had to skip Cha-Lee's Mega match on Saturday and run down to Sante Fe, NM to take artwork to one of my wife's galleries.  I was a tad bummed but it was a nice little "vacation" to spend with my wife.  When someone asks me to skip a match I'm careful not to make them feel guilty for it.  I get to do a lot of shooting so asking me to do something else shouldn't be a burden.  

Anyways, I was able to shoot the Weld County match on Sunday.  As promised the "fist match after Nationals" was my chance to bust out the concealed carry gun and give it a go under match conditions.  I spent my first two years in USPSA ('03/'04) shooting that little guy and now, with everything I've learned I was curious how I would handle a gun that was clearly NOT designed for competition.  I routinely put a few mags through it at practice sessions so it's not like I don't remember how it works... just not for a match.

On the first stage I shot 26A, 4C, 1D.  It was a pleasant surprise but I knew it was a beginners luck thing.  The remainder of the match was confusing for me.  On close targets it was easy to just use target focus and see the sights with enough clarity for decent speed and accuracy.  But the far targets I found myself trying to look at the sights and when I did that the targets completely disappeared in a blurry mess.  I found myself going back to the target and really, just guessing that I was where I needed to be.  This was made VERY evident on the all steel stage where I spent a lot of time missing blurry blue and white blobs downrange.  

This "sighting at speed" confusion was only made worse by a gun that's probably not capable of shooting 8" groups at 25 yards.  It's also got "tactical" 3Dot, Tritium night sights that are just a gray, pocket lint color so finding them is a challenge unto itself.  I'm actually pretty happy with what I see in the video with respect to movement and gun handling.  I have a nice firm grip and recoil control is decent.  Overall, I'm able to run the gun. Albeit slowly and inaccurately compared to my usual. 

All challenges aside, I had a good time laughing at myself and taking a healthy load of crap from friends.  One guy in particular was just giddy over the fact he can say he whooped up on a GM.  HAHAHA.  

When all was said and done I only posted 2 mikes (one of them being the steel challenge at the end) and a single no-shoot so I didn't do half bad.  I'm not sure why I did the challenge for a "fun" match.  I should have just shot it again, but I was hoping to get another run at that stage! 

 

[Glock26Toter]

I had to skip Saturday's match, but made it to the match at Clear Creek on Sunday.  The weather held out nicely and I got to shoot with Bob Krogh which is rare.  He does a good job at keeping the energy up on his squad.

I was fairly happy with my shooting, but was reminded at every stage that I still have a long way to go in this game.  I know it never ends, but I feel like I'm in a spot right now where I make a lot of "dumb" mistakes.  I'm not trying for anything in particular right now other than to refine my shooting and stop making mistakes.  I plugged 2 no shoots this match.

One was a close target that I took on the move and just let myself haul ass into it like it was a wide open target.  I know darn well I have to slow down enough to allow proper target engagement, but just failed to do it on that target.  The other one was a very poor decision to do the old "slap and rack" load on a barrel top.  I have that technique well refined and I'm normally comfortable doing it without issue.  However, I'll usually only do it on flat table surfaces and this was the first time (or one of very few times) that I decided to do it on a crowded barrel top.  I wound up coming into my first shot with a completely screwed up grip.  I mean... completely screwed up.  I was in mid-fix on the grip when let the first shot fly and it plugged a no-shoot.  The stage also contained a mandatory reload and the grip on the reload was almost as bad causing several misses on the steel.  It was an amateur mistake and I sure felt like a bonehead for allowing it.  I'm actually not very convinced my decision to do the barrel top slap and rack was the problem.   Rather, it was the rushed execution on unfamiliar terrain and the half-assed fix.  

So, I would have done quite well against the likes of Cha-Lee and Bob Krogh if I could have just reined in the retard a tad during the match.  I did, however wind up third behind them which isn't half bad... unless you count the fact that they are not shooting open.   So alas I'm still but a grasshopper and will continue to train for consistency in order to one day run with the big boys.  

At the end of the match I decided to run an RHF gun with a Deltapoint on it.  I have not actually shot one in a match so I wanted to see how it worked on a run-and-gun stage.  I was very surprised to find that it was NOT an instant love affair.  (good news because I'm not in a position to buy yet.)  It was a plastic griped gun so the entire thing was vibrating like crazy not to mention the trigger problems I had due to the ultra long travel compared to mine.  Anyways, when I was able to shoot the darn gun with splits that were on par with my usual shooting the dot seemed to "skip" and this proved to make tracking it very difficult.  It was moving in a consistent, up and down motion but when it was moving super fast I barely saw it.  This made kind of a skip to it because it was easy to see near the top, middle, and bottom of the track, but not so much in-between.  It actually took me a while to narrow down what I had seen.

After that little test I can tell that it will require some significant training and rounds down range to really get the hang of it.  But the fact that the dot was so much sharper and consistent means that it's worth the effort to me. 

 

 

 

[CHA-LEE]

Where is the video?

[Glock26Toter]

It's been a while since I've updated my journal.  I'm not sure what's up with my lack of motivation lately.  Since Nationals I've just been lazy.  I don't think I'm having less fun, but I'm just in a mode where I feel like I need a break from thinking so hard and trying so hard.   I need to get motivated again and get on with improving my game. 

This last match at Pueblo West Sportsman's Club didn't help matters with a fresh elbow injury.  I ran a bunch of moulding on my router table during the week.  Then made it worse on Saturday when I was finishing it up and making some cuts.  Sometimes, when the stock is warped I just power grip it into the fence with my right hand.  (instead of clamping it like a dude with tennis elbow!)  At any rate, I didn't realize how bad it was until I woke up Sunday morning.  I was wincing in pain moving my bag into the truck and knew I was screwed.  I made it through the match but I could tell I was not gripping evenly and was stressed the entire time about making it worse.  I almost quit, but like a dumbass stayed in.

I have an acupuncture appointment on Thursday and it already feels much better with rest and Icy-Hot.  I don't think I did the kind of damage that will last, but it's a good reminder that I need to be careful all the time.  

In order to get back on track, I'm finishing this entry by returning to the old formula of some good aspects, identify areas for improvement and update the goal list. 

So, while I was shooting fairly inconsistently on Sunday there were some positives that came from it.   I was able to recognize the inconsistent grip and it's affect on the dot tracking.  This made me really watch it and led to some pretty decent shooting.  I shot a clean match with only about 2 - 3 deltas and nothing particularly stupid in the way of my performance.  However, areas of improvement are still easy to spot.  I was talking with Cha-Lee about transitions and he brought up some good points about how to improve them by abandoning the call immediately after the final shot is made.  I also feel like I've been losing my aggressiveness regarding movement.  Probably caused by my increased accuracy lately.  Need to shift back to getting moving once I'm done shooting.  

Goal list:

Continue calling shots like you've been lately.

Work on increasing transition speed. (transition immediately after the dot lifts and don't linger on the shot)

Move, MOVE.  When the shooting is done, get going. 

 

[Glock26Toter]

I shot a match at Weld County today.  It was a cold morning, but warmed up nicely by the time we started shooting.

At the suggestion of a friend I purchased some KT Tape and wore it today for my tennis elbow.  It was already pain free since my acupuncture on Friday but I wanted to make certain not to strain it today.  That stuff is da bomb!  It stayed stuck to me all day (I shaved my arm this morning where I intended to put it) and was comfortable too.  Waaaaay more comfortable than those darn arm strap things.   My arm had zero strain today and I feel like I can get back on strength training next week.  I'll definitely make sure to wear it when I do moulding runs in the future as well.  

I was happy with my shooting today.  Although I still managed to post 1 mike and 3-4 deltas I felt good about most of the shooting.  Nothing happened that was spectacular, but there were no moments where I felt like I fell off the wagon either.   Some engagements I was really in tune, and called shots easily (yes, even the deltas) and the only time I really lost the dot was on the classifier.  The sun angle was such that I really did lose the dot because it was gone.  I saw the dot, but there was so much glare and/or reflections that I was unable to stay focused.  I got lucky though, and just shot my way through it and still wound up with an 86.5% on it.  That's an M class score, but I'll take that instead of a mike-noshoot any day.

There was one engagement where I felt like I really made progress.  It was a stage where I wanted to shoot a row of targets on the move, but some were low risk and some were high risk targets.  I was concerned about my ability to vary the speed of engagement.  When the buzzer went off I was successful at speeding up between and during the open targets, and slowed down just enough on the harder ones.  I maximized my shooting on that portion and it was a "show yourself what's possible" moment that I haven't had in a while.  Unfortunately, it was short lived and on the very next engagement (a plate rack) I lost any time gained.  Oh well, there's always work to be done. 

So areas of improvement?  Still lacking on stage planning.  There were some plans and optimizations that were pointed out to me that I should have seen on my own. I'm frustrated every time this happens.  I want to have enough time to figure things out on my own.  But inevitably someone's like "what do you think about this plan?"  and it's some obvious shit I should have been telling them about.   This is definitely an area that I still need to improve.   

At any rate, it was a good match and I feel like I'm getting back into the groove with respect to analysis and self improvement.

Goals:

Continue calling shots like you've been lately.

Work on increasing transition speed. (transition immediately after the dot lifts and don't linger on the shot)

Move, MOVE.  When the shooting is done, get going. 

[Glock26Toter]

I ran out to AGC this morning for some technical work and a bit of practice.  

I just switched to Precision Delta bullets and wanted to chrono/sight in with them to see what differences were had.  As it turned out, the green gun was only 1" left, and the black gun was dead on.  Since it's been a while since I sighted in, I'm not sure if they were off, and the PD bullets made them less off, or if they just haven't drifted much this time.  

At any rate, I was happy with the accuracy (.75 groups at 15 yards) and after a nudge on the old C-More they were both dead on.   I didn't want to get too crazy since both guns chrono'd at 179PF with the new bullets.  This is not crazy hot, but it's certainly over where I like to be so I dropped .3 out of my powder and I'll verify with the chrono tomorrow after the match.   This should put me back in my sweet spot.   This also means a total of .5 grains less since switching to Winchester Primers and Precision Delta bullets.  If my math is correct (and it's probably not) that means I should see a savings of $1.34/1000.  That's almost $20.00/year HAHAHA!

So I did some work on transitioning.  It was recently brought to my attention that I could be getting off the target faster and decreasing transition times.  After a bit of personal reflection I believe this is a good spot to focus on improving.  Not that I'm camping out the target, but in my recently increased focus on calling shots I've become aware that the second call is creating a linger.   Today I concentrated on immediately moving the gun off the target before seeing the dot in the glass again and only reacquiring it on the next target.  The mental note that made this a conscious thought was "jerk the gun away from the 2nd shot."   That may be overstating it a bit as I'm not blindly jerking it away, but rather driving the gun AWAY from the shot that just broke.  This leads, more definitively TOWARD the next target and the dot comes back into the sight ON the next target.  

This is easily overdone, but the thought process of putting my mind on the AWAY portion of the transition rather than the TOWARD portion seemed to help me grasp, and perform the process.  I can see an improvement in the aggressiveness of the transition.  I was not tracking time or accuracy and was only focused on what I saw and felt at this new level of aggression. I did see anecdotal improvement on time as my 15 yard, 5' transitions were routinely in the .21-.23 range.  Something that I believe would have been in the .28-.30 range before.  I'm not positive and since this is the first day practicing I'll hold off any real conclusions until I can get some more trigger time on this one.  

I blasted about 80 rounds in freestyle and then switched to SHO/WHO for several rounds of the same drill.  I'm getting much more confident and comfortable with one handed shooting.  I think making an effort to run at least 2 mags at the end of each session in SHO/WHO has helped a bunch on this.

So, goals moving forward will get an edit for better transitions.

Continue calling shots like you've been lately. (careful shooting.  Watch the dot)

decrease transition time by "driving the gun away" when the final shot is called.

MOVE.  (drive the gun and yourself away from the engagement when the final shot is called)

 

 

 

[Glock26Toter]

I shot one match this weekend at Aurora Gun Club.  I was responsible for the "short stage" and the classifier.  We've had a couple of bottle necks on that stage lately with multi-string classifiers and have learned a lot about how to consider match flow when picking stages.  I failed to see a stage plan for my quickie stage that to the local range "Safety RO" violated the ranges safe angle policy.  It was an oversight and a lesson and once I found out about it didn't agree that we violated any safe angles.  It was definitely on the edge and could have resulted in bullets impacting where they shouldn't have.  However it was not going to result in bullets going over a berm, or hitting a floor so in the end, the RO and I decided it could stay.  We all know a forbidden action well into a local match will usually just result in it being thrown out.  I didn't want to do that.

Well, after blowing all the tape off of one of the targets, I got to shoot it twice.  Both runs were significantly faster than anyone could do running the "original design" way.  I learned a lesson to watch for everything and once again proved that leaving stage descriptions vague can be a good way to learn a lot about stage design. 

So, that stage and another one that included some very close, on the move engagements reminded me of my goals.  Those close targets should not result in low shot quality and it's important to stay there and AIM until the shooting is done.  The aiming can be of the loosest focus we need to provide, but it still has to have a certain level of discipline and execution or you just wind up puking points allover the place.   On both the stages that involved that type of engagement I only posted 1 delta and a few charlies. When coupled with the fact that I feel my movement was aggressive and as fast as I could move that's a significant step in my goals. 

There were a couple of stages that had some good aiming challenges as well.  While I did get a mike on one of them, for the most part I feel like I was able to get a tad more aggressive on my transitions and made progress.  The only time I feel like I lost it was on the missed target.  I was getting VERY distracted by some bad sun glare on my glass. I was seeing it the whole time when shooting that direction but for that one target allowed myself to continue moving into the transition despite not having called the shot. Basically... I called the first hit... then miss.. then an uncalled makeup shot... and moved on.  The one mike compared to some very spicy times on targets with noshoots all over them makes me feel good about the match overall and I had a good time for sure. 

So the goal list remains unchanged for now

Careful shooting.

Drive the gun away when the final shot is called.

Drive yourself away when the engagement is complete.

 

 

Edited November 28, 2016 by Glock26Toter

[warpcorps]

47 minutes ago, Glock26Toter said:

I shot one match this weekend at Aurora Gun Club.  I was responsible for the "short stage" and the classifier.  We've had a couple of bottle necks on that stage lately with multi-string classifiers and have learned a lot about how to consider match flow when picking stages.  I failed to see a stage plan for my quickie stage that to the local range "Safety RO" violated the ranges safe angle policy.  It was an oversight and a lesson and once I found out about it didn't agree that we violated any safe angles.  It was definitely on the edge and could have resulted in bullets impacting where they shouldn't have.  However it was not going to result in bullets going over a berm, or hitting a floor so in the end, the RO and I decided it could stay.  We all know a forbidden action well into a local match will usually just result in it being thrown out.  I didn't want to do that.

Well, after blowing all the tape off of one of the targets, I got to shoot it twice.  Both runs were significantly faster than anyone could do running the "original design" way.  I learned a lesson to watch for everything and once again proved that leaving stage descriptions vague can be a good way to learn a lot about stage design. 

So, that stage and another one that included some very close, on the move engagements reminded me of my goals.  Those close targets should not result in low shot quality and it's important to stay there and AIM until the shooting is done.  The aiming can be of the loosest focus we need to provide, but it still has to have a certain level of discipline and execution or you just wind up puking points allover the place.   On both the stages that involved that type of engagement I only posted 1 delta and a few charlies. When coupled with the fact that I feel my movement was aggressive and as fast as I could move that's a significant step in my goals. 

There were a couple of stages that had some good aiming challenges as well.  While I did get a mike on one of them, for the most part I feel like I was able to get a tad more aggressive on my transitions and made progress.  The only time I feel like I lost it was on the missed target.  I was getting VERY distracted by some bad sun glare on my glass. I was seeing it the whole time when shooting that direction but for that one target allowed myself to continue moving into the transition despite not having called the shot. Basically... I called the first hit... then miss.. then an uncalled makeup shot... and moved on.  The one mike compared to some very spicy times on targets with noshoots all over them makes me feel good about the match overall and I had a good time for sure. 

So the goal list remains unchanged for now

Careful shooting.

Drive the gun away when the final shot is called.

Drive yourself away when the engagement is complete.

 

 

Enjoyed this short stage - and seeing some of the different ways people chose to engage targets on what "seemed" to be a fairly straight forward approach... Out of the 3 shooters that ran behind the targets to engage - 2 of them were faster, and the third almost took a spill on the left target engagement. It was different reading the WSB that stated "engage the targets outside of Box A..."  Requiring four shots per paper and hanging the targets horizontal with the no shoot on one side and the hard cover on the other created a different challenge from left to right. Like an 8 shot bill drill with a much smaller target area.  Nice work and thanks for the great stage!

[CHA-LEE]

Stage design lesson...... If you allow shooters to get close enough to targets to blow the tape off while shooting at it then its too close. You only waste time in reshoots and or inaccurate scoring if the tape can get blown off the targets because you allow the shooters to get to close. 

Most stage design failures are usually due to the person setting it up only thinking of the "Intended" way the stage should be shot. Doing this allows glaring issues to develop with the stage design because you are only vetting it from a perspective of how you intend to shoot it. Once I stopped setting up stages with a specific intent of how it should be shot I stopped having issues with missing glaring issues. You need to look at the stage from a perspective of all potential ways it could be shot while setting it up and or defining the WSB verbiage, not just your intended method. I have setup some of the most challenging and fun stages by doing this process of simply making sure that every possible way of shooting the stage is vetted and making sure I am not forcing shooters to engage more than 8 rounds worth of targets from a single position. When I setup a stage I don't even look at it from a perspective of how I will shoot it or what the best stage plan will be. That happens after the stage is finalized and the match is ready to start.  

[Glock26Toter]

I was able to shoot a match at Aurora Gun Club this weekend.  I worked in the garage all day Saturday and got my arm good and sore and was worried about it on Sunday morning when it still hurt like hell.  I put the KT tape on by myself and figured out a pretty good way to do that, so next time I'll be SURE to put it on for woodworking no matter how minor the project seems when I get started!  Once again, the tape did it's job and the elbow didn't hurt at all during the match.

I was also responsible for the classifier/mini stage again.  Once again I made a stage design mistake that resulted in a bit of discussion but I think the solution was good and nobody screwed it up that I was aware of.   Basically the design of the 2nd stage had you shooting across the first one.  Something that on paper looked like a non-issue.  We routinely shoot stages in which you can see the other stages targets.  However this one mixed the targets a little too well for some people's liking.  I thought it was a non issue... I mean, just don't shoot the wrong targets right?  In the end a few well placed barrels made everyone happy.  Next time I'll be more careful about the mix.

The match itself I was very happy with.  I shot a clean match, but suffered too many deltas for my liking.  On my own stage I shot 4 deltas and had a mix-up on one array that cost me several seconds.  I wound up 17th place (combined) on that stage.  Luckily it was only an 80 point stage, but it was a reminder that I'm not yet done learning consistency lessons. 

On the remaining stages there were no stage planning issues.  I was confident that I had optimized the shooting as was able to keep the gun running throughout some positions that took careful execution and optimization that I felt were tip top.  I posted some decent times and was able maintain a high alpha count.  I think that's good progress in my goal set of shooting when I need to shoot and moving when I need to move.  

Improvement?  Well, the usual.  I made some mistakes in squeezing the trigger with little or no sight picture.  In each case I was able to catch myself and re-engage so I knew I did it immediately but it cost me huge amounts of time.  I also let things get too loose a few times and paid the price with a high delta count.

So the goal list remains unchanged for now

Careful shooting.

Drive the gun away when the final shot is called.

Drive yourself away when the engagement is complete.

 

[Glock26Toter]

It's been several days of crazy work schedule in Ontario California, but now that I'm back I wanted to get an entry down for last weekend's match.  It was down at Pueblo West Sportsman's club.  The weather turned out pretty decent and I had a good time shooting the match.  I took almost all POV videos (Link here) and have watched it several times looking for improvement in my goals. 

I was very happy with my shooting and although I think I see transitions that are not nearly aggressive enough, the big transitions are super aggressive and what I've been shooting for in my "Drive yourself away..." goal. 

The classifier reminded me that equipment maintenance is always important.  I hadn't cleaned, or even touched my green gun since 2 weeks prior.  Last weekend I remember thinking "green gun battery is questionable and it's still dirty.... I'll grab the black one today."  Well, this week I thought the same thing about the black gun and grabbed the green one.  When shooting the classifier, as I made ready I looked at the dot and was like... yeesh, that sucker is a bit dim.  Well, it was too dim to see at the speeds required to do anything effectively.  I managed to get through the stage but it was not pretty.  

The following stage (new batteries!) I just myself get distracted.  The initial mistake of missing a steel and transitioning out of a port wasn't a big deal.  What was a big deal was that my mind was already figuring out how to get a decent makeup shot back on it, while the rest of my body was trying to shoot 4 long shots through a 3.5" wide angled port.  I wound up hitting the wood twice and sending bullets of into miketopia.  Two mikes is NOT how to wrap up an otherwise sweet match, but that's exactly what happened.

So lessons / goals?

Careful shooting.  (only a couple of deltas... I made progress here.)

Drive the gun away when the final shot is called. (hmmm. I felt like I did that, but the vids paint a different picture.  Keep working on this)

Drive yourself away when the engagement is complete. (This I feel I made progress on.  Not evident in the vids, but I'm pushing hard to get to the next target when it involves movement.)

Maintenance.  DO IT!  (When you buy 357 batteries for $1.25 ea it sure as hell doesn't pay to conserve and screw your match)

 

[Glock26Toter]

I practiced today with a couple of buddies.  I'ts been a while since I practiced and I'm VERY lucky to have a friend who gained fairly rare access to an indoor range with lots of props.  We setup a nice 30 round stage and shot it a bunch of times.  I felt pretty good about most of the shooting but it was pointed out to me that my transitions are lacking.  

I need to work harder at my goal to "drive the gun away" and more than just that I need to work on my ability to call that final shot and be done with it.  That goal is really about trying to instantly call that 2nd shot and commit to moving on - and into the transition.  

I need to setup some transition drills and really work on what I'm seeing in the sight as the final shot breaks so I can get to the "driving the gun away" part with more aggressiveness.

My financial situation is not quite what it was two years ago and I put myself in a bit of a bind with a large remodel and spending lots of $$ on trips last year to major matches.  This year I'm going to have to rein it in a touch and only go to matches that don't involve travel $$.  I have plenty of miles to go wherever I want, but the extra costs of hotel, food, car and match fees will have to be stifled this year.  I've decided that, although motivated by finances I need to get on board with this idea and make it align with my goals rather than look at it as a set back. (an attitude that has been affecting my motivation lately.) Sooo....

I'm going to take this coming year to really work on honing my skills and become a proper GM.  Rather than spend money going to matches and losing to the top dogs, I'll stay around here and commit more $$ to practice and training.  I also have a vacation day "surplus" at work and will commit to taking those vacation hours to spend on training.  Hopefully this will lead to a better showing at next years area matches... and especially Nationals.  I'll also hopefully have some decent funds in the account for the spring-bling that we all suffer when having to fork over the big bucks in Jan,Feb,Mar signing up for most of the matches we plan to attend.  By then I'll have a shit-load of miles and hotel points and save even more!

Goals:

Call the shot and drive away.  (need more video review and PRACTICE this particular skill)

Drive yourself away and into the next transition.  (I've realized that when it's several steps I'm good at this.  But when it's one or two steps I'm not)

 

[Glock26Toter]

I made it to Aurora Gun Club for a local match on Sunday this past weekend.  The weather cooperated nicely and I wound up not even wearing a coat most of the day.  I shot a pretty solid match and only had 2 deltas.  I seemed to have a pretty successful time at calling my shots and moving quickly.  I can't say that I made any real improvement on my specific goals of transitioning, but I didn't lose any ground and was definitely aggressive.  I only lost my consistency on one stage for a single array.  Unfortunately it was a very far array (about 30 yards I think) and it led to 2... yes TWO mikes on that stage.  

The problem on my "problem" stage was that it was a very aggressive one-step transition into an array that you could see for quite a distance before running to a final position.  The anticipation of the final run, coupled with the aggressive step proved too much motivation for my feet.  I wound up shooting 3, 30 yard targets on the move and paid the price in shot quality. 

So bottom line is, I shot a pretty decent match but still need significant work on my goal set.

Goals:

Call the shot and be done.

Drive yourself away and into the next transition.

[Glock26Toter]

I was able to shoot a local match, and get some practice in this past weekend.  For January in Colorado we've been incredibly lucky and this weekend, while not exactly warm was good enough to get out and do some blasting.  

Saturday I spent the day at Ben Lomond gun club shooting a local match.  My shooting contained more mistakes than normal and I was pretty disappointed with my score.  The first stage I let myself get lazy and not think about whether to reload or not.  Upon running the stage I ran out of rounds on the last peice of steel and took a mike.  Later, I kept looking at a no-shoot partial target and although it was at a risky position I decided to shoot at the alpha zone instead of higher up for two C's or even a head shot. I paid the price and although I made the shot up, I wound up with a no-shoot.  I did this again on another stage and that one ended up being left as a mike,no-shoot.  With one more mike thrown on the classifier the total damage was 3 mikes and 2 no-shoots.  OUCH!

I'm not sure if shooting with some freinds visiting from out of the country caused me to get lazy or if I was just being stupid.  Either way, not taking the match seriously enough led to a performance that I'm hoping not to repeat.  What went well?  I did have some success at what I feel are some good transitions and some pretty decent times that kept up decently with the two GM's taking 1st and 2nd. So despite some serious mistakes overall I feel like I made some progress on my goals.  The following day I was invited to practice at that same club and decided, "to hell with any responsibilities" and went for it. HAHA!  We setup one of the stages from the previous day's match that had led to some discussion and shot that all day.  The stage, naturally didn't end up getting setup exactly the same but I feel it was better because it allowed us to shoot it in a bunch of different configurations.  

While the best plan for that particular stage was discussed I tried not to worry about it and just pretend it could only be shot in the 2-3 ways I chose.  I was more worried about trying to improve my accuracy(calling the shot and being done) and especially my aggressiveness with transitions.  I feel like I made some progress (although not much in the accuracy department) and a lengthy discussion between myself and Cha-Lee led to my learning something about the stage plan in the end.  Unfortunately I executed his point pretty poorly and wound up hurting my foot.  I could barely walk on it afterwards and felt like a dork when everyone was like "let us young guys pickup the stage and you just rest your dumb ass in the car."  I still helped clean up and after some IB, Cold pack, and a night's rest the foot was fine. 

I'm feeling myself getting lazy with shooting, analysis, and motivation.  I'm trying not to let that happen and making myself continue journaling is really helping that.  I get all "screw that" for a few days, but after I do it, I'm like "when's the next match?!"

Goals:

Call the shot and be done.

Drive yourself away and into the next transition.

Adding in, Be confident on the aggressive transitions! (I almost always fire 3 shots at big, aggressive 180 transitions and this usually leads to 3 good hits.)

[Glock26Toter]

It was good time blasting this weekend with two matches.  One at Aurora Gun Club on Saturday and another at Centennial Gun Club on Sunday night.

I had worked a pretty hard schedule during the week and almost skipped Saturday's match to relax.  Only to realize that to truly relax I needed to be shooting!

The match went well and I shot a clean match.  Something I haven't done in a long time.  I feel like I shot consistently, and didn't take any extra precautions in order to accomplish it.

There was one stage with a ton of head shots and no-shoots that I probably could have pushed harder on but that stage put me in survival mode.  I was very deliberate to call my shots and really watch the transitioning to ensure I didn't pick up any penalties.  I still wound up with a very respectable time and it was certainly the right choice for that engagement given my current ability.  Had some top Open GM's been in attendance I would probably not have won the stage, but certainly wouldn't have lost the match based on that performance.

The match had me very pumped and feeling good at the end of the day and I had a great time.  Areas of improvement were certainly still easy to find in their usual places.  The classifier for instance was one that I know I'm capable of picking up a good score.  But I just didn't focus enough and shot waaaaaay too many charlies to be proud of.   I also had another stage where I posted a time quite a bit quicker than anyone else, but this was the result of not waiting for a good sight picture and picked up a 2 (or 3... can't remember) deltas.  Proof, once again that the balance between speed and accuracy is very easy to upset. 

 

But again, I just had a good time and prefer to leave the match on the positive note that I made progress on my goals.

 

Then it was the indoor match at Centennial.  It was certainly crowded and the usual "80% rule" was in affect.  I had a good time trying to help some new shooters and while I was unable to pull off another clean match I managed to get some video to really look carefully for goal improvements. 

Reviewing the 2 stages I can immediately see some pretty sloppy footwork coming off the blue barrel.  This leads to an unstable platform while shooting on the move.  On top of that I called a mike, but had already moved on.  Upon going back for the makeup I went back to the wrong target so the makeup shot was simply wasted time.  Also, I clearly don't get deep enough into the port on the right.  This lead to my transitions, although aggressive being new positions instead.  

On the 2nd stage I can see that I've made some improvements in my transitions.  I like the way I aggressively push into the next array at each opportunity.  I also was very stable during all my shooting on the move.  This was rewarded with high shot quality (no deltas) and I wound up with a 13.78 HF on that stage.

 

A good time for sure!  I'm looking forward to shooting next weekend in some decent weather. (hopefully!)  I'll be traveling to Fort Myers FL for a weekend getaway and shooting a local match at the FMPSA club down there.  

  

Goals:

Call the shot and be done.

Drive yourself away and into the next transition.

Be confident on the aggressive transitions.