WJM's road to Master

[WJM]

Newest episode of the Tangbrolio Podcast. We talked about the offseason, our best lesson learned, and a few upcoming matches.

Still working on reading different material and figuring out how best I want to train.

Ordered a Tanfo Stock 2 today, so that means my dad and I won't have to share a pistol, and I can start building mine.

Thanks,

Wyatt

Edited November 11, 2015 by WJM

[WJM]

Group and I discuss dry fire and what it really entails.

I am of the apparent unpopular opinion that par timers work.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Starting my training "officially" next week after finals..

BUUTTTT I am super stressed from school, so I decided to start working out and dry firing to get my hands used to it again. I am worried that I will only be able to do certain amounts of dry fire without tearing up my baby hands again. The calluses should show up again after a week or so of my regime.

Waking up at 5:40AM, Gym by 6:00, home by 7:00 hopefully, dry fire for an hour or so til 8AM when I have to leave for school.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Signed up for Area 2.

If anyone is reading this, and has shot Area 2, could you guys give me some advice on what to practice or what will happen?

Thanks,

Wyatt

[WJM]

Update of sorts.

January 1st I made a shooting board, which helps me keep track of how many practices I have done. I have made the goal to do 140 practices before A2. Practice is either Dry Fire, Live Fire, or a match. This amounts to exactly two dry fires a day, and 20 live fires or matches. Right now I am around 35, which isn't enough and my hands already hate me so we will see how close to 140 I get. I know I will hit 100 but 140 just seems out of reach to be honest.

Each dry fire is between 35 minutes to an hour or so. I don't keep track of the exact time, but I can usually tell when I do more than 30, my hands start to hurt and the tanfo stippling makes marks in my hands.

Shot an indoor match, placed 2nd overall and 1st in production. Pulled a no shoot that cost me the overall, and so as a result I worked on partial draws for around 2 hours after that. As it was I can definitely say I wasn't expecting a 2nd overall with the talent field that showed up for the match.

Last week there was an interesting development. Tore the skin off my fingers on my right hand. I think I am gripping with my weak hand enough.

Got a new gun. Did a trigger job on said gun, and replaced said guns springs with medium Eric Grauffel springs. And holy mother of pearl that thing has a heavy trigger. Ordered Light springs last week, and I am putting the gun together tonight after DF and homework. Positive thing is that the medium springs has taught me lots of AMAZING fundamentals and trigger control. It will pay off for A2 and A1.

Did a few live fires. Partials at 25 was interesting with this new gun. And I found that when transitioning to an open target at 25 my eyes weren't moving to the correct location. I fixed this and as a result my times went down and consistency went up.

Did another live fire specifically for A2 with swingers at 15-20 yards. Basically my dad and I made them run AS FAST as we could possibly make them. I am talking maybe 1 shot per pass if you time it correctly. Lots of it was timing but near the end I was able to finally watch the target and my sights. This was by far the hardest thing I have tried to do with a pistol, especially considering right after activating the popper we had to engage a head shot no shoot partial at 13 yards. But it was a tough practice, and I found that unless I make the drill hard for me to shoot without a penalty, its not hard enough and I don't learn as much. I'd much rather shoot a no shoot in practice than in a match.

Anyways thats about it. I have been keeping a handwritten journal so I haven't been posting on here, mostly because it doesn't matter if I post here or not. But I figured this may be a better way to keep track of match footages.

Wyatt

[WJM]

I did a thing. 1,000 draws in a week? Yeah I think it could help.

Also, match footage. Took 2nd to Mr Brian Nelson. Bummed I couldn't take the win home in Production, but ultimately my brain failed me and I was unable to control my shooting as I usually can.

Had the opportunity to shoot with Sam Travis, learned a TON from him about what to do in a match and what not to do, along with Dave Shore. Also made some very good friends in the process.

I am learning more and more the importance of dry fire just having watched my dad get to the level he is now at just from a month of dry fire. The improvement and drive is real.

[WJM]

Trying to build speed.

Set up two boxes around 8 yards apart. With a "ladder" between them. Gives me enough space to do a reload before I start the ladder, but also enough to get into position without being running the ladder. I can tell this will help my skills a lot.

Haven't live fired for a while, but I think a couple friends and I will go Wednesday, I have a match Saturday, practice Sunday, match the following Thursday, practice that Friday Saturday and Sunday, then A2 the weekend after that.

LETS GOOOOO!

[WJM]

Match today. Had a goal to win by 15%, only won by 12.

Messed up the first stage bad, hands were frozen solid and trigger finger just wouldn't work. Had to RO most the day, and I think thats why I forgot the steel on the hoser stage. No excuses, both were my own fault, just trying to learn what not to do next time.

Wyatt

[WJM]

I have been working on preparing for my matches more, I have noticed an increase in focus and deliberation.

As with exams in college, I always wake up an 2 hours before I take an exam. For matches this has begun to be the same way. I found if I don't do this, I am not completely awake for the exam or for the match.

So for example, if my match starts at 8 pm, then I would wake up at minimum 6am. However, my normal habit is now to wake up at 5am every day including Sunday which is training day for me.

Basically, I try and go to bed between 9 and 10 o clock, so I get between 7 and 8 hours of sleep before a match. I found that if I have between 4-6 hours of sleep, its not that I am tired but my eyes and reflexes don't work as well as they do when I am fully rested.

Anyways, wake up at 5am, dry fire for an hour. Usually this is just position entry, or gun handling. Mainly I want to make sure the gun is where I mean to point it. After my dry fire, I grab my first cup of coffee and do some meditation and power yoga. Not enough to overextert myself, just to get limbered up. Then I eat a small breakfast, and go through all my gear a second time (also do it the night before).

Show up to match usually 35 minutes to an hour early to walk stages and get an idea of what I will see. Make notes in my journal about anything confusing (sort of a mini large match stage planning idea) and then once I find out what stage I start at I go there until I start. I don't do the whole group walk throughs of stages, don't do meetings. Just kinda focus on what I need to do.

Anyways this was more for me than anything else, but thats how I prep for a match.

[WJM]

Heeding the advice of every top level shooter I know of, my dad and I built a drill that I will be using before every major match I shoot from now on. I have dubbed it "Practically Impossible". 11 rounds in first mag, each other mag loaded to 10.

The drill is compromised of a zebra hardcover target on the far left, next is a no shoot up to about half of the alpha zone, next is a plate rack, then the next to the right is an open target, then finally is a no shoot that is place so the shoulder of the no shoot covers about half the alpha zone.

Start at 45 yards, draw and engage all of the targets and two plates, move up to 30 yards while reloading, engage all of the paper and two plates, move up to 15 and engage all of the paper and the final two plates. The goal is to get the fewest amount of mikes.

Admittadly I didn't clean this drill once. The best I was able to do was 32 seconds and 3 mikes. BUTTT I did notice a HUGE improvement on my distance shooting, along with my ability to shoot at 15 yards. 15 yards almost became EASY to shoot all alphas at a very fast pace, when compared to the hellish distance of 45 yards.

I am ready for Area 2.

Edited February 28, 2016 by WJM

[WJM]

I'd like to say that it was because of the flu that I shot like such dogshit, but I know it was completely a mental issue.

I built the match up too much in my head. Basically the stages weren't any more difficult than our easiest local club. I built the match up to be super difficult, 50 yard partials and other stuff. It just simply wasn't the case. I went into the 3rd day with the mindset that it wasn't a big deal just another day of shooting, and I scored within a couple percent of Dave on 3 of the last 4 stages.

Another thing I found that was really interesting, none of the top guys actually look all that fast. Don't get me wrong, I get that they shoot fast and I am not calling them slow at all, but it really seemed like they never split faster than maybe 20? They just have 20 transitions to match all the splits. Big lesson for me.

Sat down and talked with a few of the top shooters of our sport and was able to ask them some of my questions for a couple hours. Took a lot of mental notes, and really learned a ton.

Placed 11th in Production out of about 90 people. 3rd master so I got a cool award. Shot 9 mikes, and 2 no shoots. 2 of the mikes were on targets about 6 feet away, so f*#k me right?

Another thing to note, I learned a TON about what to do and what I have been working on. My shooting on the move is really solid in a match. 20 splits at 7 yards, and pulled all alphas on every target I shot on the move. My running skills have improved a lot, and I am noticing less dead time. When I compared my footage to Brian Nelsons, Dave Sevignys, or Jacob Hetheringtons we all got to position in about the same time, my reloads for the most part were either on par or faster, draw was on par or faster, but I absolutely got SLAUGHTERED on steel. Just way too many makeups and it showed.

So ultimately, what did I take away? My transitions will become much better. I have goals from talking to some top shooters, I want to get mid 20's on a consistent basis, and I want to be able to actually watch my sights at that speed. I can right now, but I didn't push it in the match for whatever dumbass reason of mine. I need to be able to see much faster, and have a lot more acuteness in my vision. I don't want to blame my gear, but I ordered some new glasses to see if they helped with it. I tried some Tombstones and damn they made it much easier to see. Can't hurt to be able to see easier.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Been a while since I have posted. Been shooting matches, and finally have all the video made, so I will now be doing an update on them.

TTI Zion Classic, was easily the most fun match I have been to. Lots of shooting on the move, swingers, movers, gully runs, lots of fun stuff that you don't see every day. I felt like I honestly shot very good. Had 1 mike, and 1 no shoot for the whole match. I felt like I was calling my shots well, I was just always off pace a little bit. By the time I really started to make a push for points, it was too late. Learned a lot about my level of skill, and where to push and how much if I need to. The only bad stage I felt I had was one I had to go first on a tricky swinger sequence. Involved a popper that activated a clamshell and a swinger. I shot it a certain way, and it ended up screwing me on timing, and the swinger was where I couldn't see it for about 2 seconds. I figured if I had this more down I could've been closer to 96% of the match winner, but I was still a little off from BNels.

Shot an indoor match for fun/practice. Was working on really motoring my transitions, as that has been a strength of mine and I missed the boat on that at Zion Classic I felt like. Ended up winning overall.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Shot a local USPSA match. Had another timing issue on a drop turner thing. Still experimenting to see if I really want to attack certain disappearing targets. Transitions were pushed, and as a result dropped 13 (yes you read that right) 13 charlies on a stage. Granted the targets were angled, and I think that a good portion of them were caused by them being angled so I couldn't really get a full alpha presentation. However, I still dropped C's on close targets where I wasn't really looking in the correct spot. My fault, will fix this. Ended up winning production, and taking 4th overall. Beat a couple of really good open and limited GM's and M's so I am happy with my score. First match in a while where I just focused on having fun and just shooting again. Had a blast, and really learned a ton about my game.

Found out I love going first. Can't stand going last in order.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Working with the timer on fast transitions. Mainly focusing on doing Bens "Widening Transitions" drill further and further apart, then when I find my max doing 10 reps at that same distance apart at the 1.6 pace to build the consistency of it.

Seems to be helping that and a combined focus on gripping the hell out of the gun.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Faster transitions are a go. Bad thing is the makeups I needed. We had a couple stages that were extremely hardcover/barrel heavy, so I don't feel terrible doing a make up when I though the sights looked odd, and it turns out I called them good 4/5 correctly. The one I didn't call correctly was a far delta I made up with a close to alpha c hit. This shit never ends.

Ended up with a Production win, but I still need to get my transitions faster. I still think there is a second or so a stage I could be saving, if not 2 seconds or so. I need to see faster. My mental game is mostly there, my reloads are pretty consistent, and my long range shooting is good.

Tanfoglio seems to be running like a champ. Haven't had a malfunction or anything to speak of in over 5k rounds, so I am a happy boy.
​
Wyatt

[WJM]

Standards work today. 15 yard Freestyle, Strong Hand, and Weak Hand. MUCH MUCH better at it now. Really good experience, and on top of LOTS of weak hand and strong hand work I also got in freestyle work with draws and reloads.

Only had 1 messed up live fire reload today. Really smooth and worked really well.

Tried some 15 yard partial work. Wasn't happening so I stopped wasting bullets at it.

Did a 50 yard group today. God smiled down on me, 5 round group, 2 inches across.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Oh also.

Today I ran drills right to left. No idea why, but it was smoother and faster for me. I'll update this after I dry fire tonight and live fire tomorrow but I think this is how I am going to keep it if I can help it.

Also tried positioning my body to be set up for the maximum strong hand only benefit, i.e. Strong hand leg forward weakhand leg back, from the start (for freestyle and strong hand) and it seemed to help the transition a ton, especially considering my feet never move just my torso.

Really happy with the progress of more live fire. Still have that goal to shoot 5k before A1 and I am edging much and much closer to it. Sitting right around 1500 or so, so I'll definitely hit the goal but don't want to make a higher goal than that.

If I hit less but I am happy with where I am at I will consider that a win in my book.

Wyatt

[WJM]

Match videooooooooooo

[WJM]

Also I made GM so I guess the "Road To Master" title is pretty dated..

[Glock26Toter]

Congrats on the GM!  

[drmweaver2]

Yes.  Congratulations on making GM! 

[WJM]

Thanks you guys! I actually made it back in May, but like I said its been a while since I updated here. Most of my range diary is over on doodie project but I think I will start copying whatever I post on one website to the other.

Been dry firing pretty hardcore lately. Around an hour a day, depending how my back and elbow feel. 

Its been going good. I have gotten my live fire reloads down to around a second with pretty good consistency. Draw and grip are much better, and so thats a good thing. 

I still need to learn how to exit a position faster. I understand the concept of shooting while leaving and all of that, I just am having a tough time figuring out how to tell my body to go.. NOW. Gonna try a few different things, maybe apply one of them before Utah state.

The next 3 weekends I have "majors" every single weekend. First one is a local "championship" at a smaller club. Not USPSA, but I have wanted to win it for a few years so that will be fun. The weekend after this one is Utah state, which was my match bump to open last year. The following weekend is Idaho State which I have to defend because I won it last year.

I plan on shooting groups at around 35-50 yards up until Utah and Idaho. Probably do some bill drills and blake drills at 35-50, and then a few days before I will move the targets into 15 or so and practice at that range with partials. That seems to get my confidence going and thats what I need right now.

Wyatt

[WJM]

I figured I will post the match videos I have neglected to post for the last little while.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[WJM]

 

[WJM]

Idaho Match win. 92.5% of points shot, 1 No Shoot, 2 Deltas for the match. Really happy with all of it except the steel make ups.

Wyatt