Ammo to practice or training class where is my $ best spent?

[mrgoodwrench]

So i am an above average shooter with a fair amount of experience but i feel i have plateaued and would like to improve. So here is the question i currently ahoot 50-100 rounds live fire at least 1 time a week. Other than that i dont practice i know i need to pick up dry fire ect... but here is my question im looking at taking a pistol training corse at bil rodgers shooting school but its out of state so ball park the training and trip and ammo will probably cost me aprox $3,000 am i better off with the class or am i better off staying home and spending $3,000 on ammo and practicing. Class is 5 days classroom and live fire aprox 2500 rnds. Thanks for any input. And feel free to call me a dummy for not having dry fire practiced enough i know its free to do and will help i just havent made it a priority yet but am planning to.  Also anyone who has taken bill rodgers shooting class please give me your opinion. Thanks mike

[Sarge]

Do you shoot competitions?

[mrgoodwrench]

I run and shoot a weekly uspsa style shoot from may through sept then shoot less during the winter months. Of the 20 shooters that show weekly im usually 1 or 2 place. Im a decent shooter but ive never had any training ive just learned what i can from youtube vids ect...  my safety and basic gun handling i believe are sound. 

[xrayfk05]

Classes and training are great, it is a lot easier if someone tells you what you can improve on and how rather than finding it out yourself.  Practice does not make perfect, it makes permanent! In other words you need to practice right.

That said, if you don't train and only shoot once a week you can take all the classes you can find but it will not help you much. You will need to train on and practice the things you learned at the classes, otherwise it is just wasted money. (Classes can be fun though, that can be reason enough to take one)

 

I would never take a $3000,- class and certainly not a 5 day one. 5 days is just too long to stay focused and either you get overloaded with info or it's a lot of repetition which you can do yourself for free.

 

I'm sure there are other options than just dropping 1000's of dollars on a single class, $500,- get you 8 hours of one-on-one time with Steve Anderson for example and I am sure there are other trainers that do the same. And that training will be specifically tailored to you.

There is also the option of a videocall or a video analysis for $50 to $100.- (Again at Anderson, but I think Tom Castro and Ben Stoeger have something similar)

[mrgoodwrench]

1 hour ago, xrayfk05 said:

Classes and training are great, it is a lot easier if someone tells you what you can improve on and how rather than finding it out yourself.  Practice does not make perfect, it makes permanent! In other words you need to practice right.

That said, if you don't train and only shoot once a week you can take all the classes you can find but it will not help you much. You will need to train on and practice the things you learned at the classes, otherwise it is just wasted money. (Classes can be fun though, that can be reason enough to take one)

 

I would never take a $3000,- class and certainly not a 5 day one. 5 days is just too long to stay focused and either you get overloaded with info or it's a lot of repetition which you can do yourself for free.

 

I'm sure there are other options than just dropping 1000's of dollars on a single class, $500,- get you 8 hours of one-on-one time with Steve Anderson for example and I am sure there are other trainers that do the same. And that training will be specifically tailored to you.

There is also the option of a videocall or a video analysis for $50 to $100.- (Again at Anderson, but I think Tom Castro and Ben Stoeger have something similar)

Thanks for the response to clarify the class is $1400 the total of $3000 would include ammo and travel food ect... but i do agree it is still spendy.   I agree i need to practice at home but to be honest i feel like i dont really know how to practice effectively at home.  My thinking is from my research i find billrodgers shooting school to be the top of the line so i was thinking take a class i feel is top of the line and if i dont see the benifit never bother with a class again and if i see improvement then i would take other classes aswell. I figured to give training a fair shake take a good class. I will look into what you reccamended though

 Thanks mike

Edited March 11 by mrgoodwrench

[ChuckS]

Any kind of good training is cool. But, in USPSA competition, a good bit of your time is spent not shooting . A competition oriented class would help you get more efficient in the non-shooting tasks. 

 

Good luck!

Chuck

[mrgoodwrench]

17 minutes ago, ChuckS said:

Any kind of good training is cool. But, in USPSA competition, a good bit of your time is spent not shooting . A competition oriented class would help you get more efficient in the non-shooting tasks. 

 

Good luck!

Chuck

Thanks 

[Racinready300ex]

If you're stuck you probably need to take a class with someone who can point you in the direction you need to go.

 

3k is a lot in a class, and 5 days is a lot for a class. It sounds like something that would be fun, but more likely a shorter 1 or 2 day class would be cheaper and you might retain the information better. 

 

Maybe check out PTSG, lots of good info over there and you can get some video reviews that might point you in a good direction with out taking a class. 

[RJH]

Buy a couple of dry fire books and movement books and a timer

 

By press and a bunch of components

 

Practice and dry firing and movement skills

 

Take a class in about a year or next time there's one close to you so you don't have as much tied up in travel etc

 

Even after you take the class, the dry fire books and press and components will be very useful

 

However, if you're not going to dry fire and live fire practice no class or books or press is going to help you get better

 

Good luck

[mrgoodwrench]

3 minutes ago, RJH said:

Buy a couple of dry fire books and movement books and a timer

 

By press and a bunch of components

 

Practice and dry firing and movement skills

 

Take a class in about a year or next time there's one close to you so you don't have as much tied up in travel etc

 

Even after you take the class, the dry fire books and press and components will be very useful

 

However, if you're not going to dry fire and live fire practice no class or books or press is going to help you get better

 

Good luck

You are all correct for sure about the dry fire and practice at home and i plan to i just need to figure out how to do it correctly.  Any reccamendations on dry fire routines? Books? Youtube vids? Thanks mike

[Maximis228]

You brain will be mush after 2 days of class. I don't see value in taking anything longer. I would save your money for a class that is closer to you and buy the ammo in the mean time. 

[RJH]

1 minute ago, mrgoodwrench said:

You are all correct for sure about the dry fire and practice at home and i plan to i just need to figure out how to do it correctly.  Any reccamendations on dry fire routines? Books? Youtube vids? Thanks mike

 

Id probably start with Ben Stoeger books and kind of go from there. 

 

I took one of his books a long time ago did just a little the  dry fire stuff in it and in no time at all I'd moved from B class to A class. Then I quit practicing and just hover around upper b lower a now

 

I'm sure if I would have put more into it I would have gotten more out of it, another guy I know used the same book to get to m class, then he kind of quit practicing and hangs out in the high a low m class now

 

Both of those examples show how it's not just getting the book or taking a class that matters it's what comes after that that will help you to improve

 

 

The reason I suggest going with a couple of books and reloading gear instead of a class at this point is because you can buy the books for 20 or so dollars and see if you're actually going to commit to doing the dry fire routines and other practice. If you go to a class and spend $500 to $3,000 and come home and don't put in any work off of what you learned in that class you're not going to get any better. Me being the cheap guy I am I want to know that I'm going to put forth the effort before I spend that kind of money

[mrgoodwrench]

2 hours ago, RJH said:

 

Id probably start with Ben Stoeger books and kind of go from there. 

 

I took one of his books a long time ago did just a little the  dry fire stuff in it and in no time at all I'd moved from B class to A class. Then I quit practicing and just hover around upper b lower a now

 

I'm sure if I would have put more into it I would have gotten more out of it, another guy I know used the same book to get to m class, then he kind of quit practicing and hangs out in the high a low m class now

 

Both of those examples show how it's not just getting the book or taking a class that matters it's what comes after that that will help you to improve

 

 

The reason I suggest going with a couple of books and reloading gear instead of a class at this point is because you can buy the books for 20 or so dollars and see if you're actually going to commit to doing the dry fire routines and other practice. If you go to a class and spend $500 to $3,000 and come home and don't put in any work off of what you learned in that class you're not going to get any better. Me being the cheap guy I am I want to know that I'm going to put forth the effort before I spend that kind of money

Good advise. I already own a hornady progressive press. But i will check out the books. 

[MikeyScuba]

We did a 5 day TPC course in Utah.  Fun but you can only pick up so much.  Our best training $ ever spent was a 2 and 3 day private lesson with Steve Anderson a yr apart.

[mrgoodwrench]

8 minutes ago, MikeyScuba said:

We did a 5 day TPC course in Utah.  Fun but you can only pick up so much.  Our best training $ ever spent was a 2 and 3 day private lesson with Steve Anderson a yr apart.

Ill have to look into this steve anderson several recommendations for him now thanks 

[MikeyScuba]

You won’t regret it!

[JonasAberg]

That's a lot of money for sure.

The bottom line seems to be - are you able to analyze your shooting/stage performance and adapt your training to become better? If you can do this yourself, you might not need classes. It does take more trial and error though, and having other people look at what you're doing can often give you fresh ideas and viewpoints.

Once you get to a certain level, it's definitely "diminishing returns on investment" and every % starts costing more time and effort, so you need to think about how much you're willing to invest.

 

[mrgoodwrench]

18 minutes ago, JonasAberg said:

That's a lot of money for sure.

The bottom line seems to be - are you able to analyze your shooting/stage performance and adapt your training to become better? If you can do this yourself, you might not need classes. It does take more trial and error though, and having other people look at what you're doing can often give you fresh ideas and viewpoints.

Once you get to a certain level, it's definitely "diminishing returns on investment" and every % starts costing more time and effort, so you need to think about how much you're willing to invest.

 

Good input thanks

[old558]

Do you shoot at different clubs?  If not try others. Also ask around maybe a local GM willing to help.

[cautery]

$3k?  5 days?

I advise against both.

Bestest/fastest learning in a "class" I ever had was a 2-day class with Manny.  Don't remember how many rounds, but I was toast by the end, and still shooting 300% better....  for a while. 

Gotta practice EVERY DAY if you want to be better than good.
Dry fire, dry fire, dry fire...  Less than 1 in 10 pulls should be live... unless you just like making empty brass. 

My 2/100ths of a pretty piece of paper...  worth what you paid. 

[mrgoodwrench]

2 minutes ago, cautery said:

$3k?  5 days?

I advise against both.

Bestest/fastest learning in a "class" I ever had was a 2-day class with Manny.  Don't remember how many rounds, but I was toast by the end, and still shooting 300% better....  for a while. 

Gotta practice EVERY DAY if you want to be better than good.
Dry fire, dry fire, dry fire...  Less than 1 in 10 pulls should be live... unless you just like making empty brass. 

My 2/100ths of a pretty piece of paper...  worth what you paid. 

Thanks for the info. Who is manny?   

[cautery]

8 minutes ago, mrgoodwrench said:

Thanks for the info. Who is manny?   

Oops... sorry.  Emanuel "Manny" Bragg.  GM, instructor, past office holder, EXCELLENT instructor, and just one helluva guy. 

[DougCarden]

I went to Bill Roger's class in the late 90s.  One of my shooting highlights in my LE career.  It is fast paced and they keep you moving all day, and you do gun handling and dry firing at night as well.  You WILL shoot a lot of ammo.  I was carrying a Beretta 92FS at the time in a security holster and it was a PITA as the 7 steel targets were at human reaction time.

IF you listen to them and use the concepts they teach you will improve immediately, and do well.  If you shoot with one eye closed it will be a long week, but I saw many people figure it out and improve quickly.

Military teams fly in and shoot for 10 days before deployment, so there is real world applications for what they teach there.  If you want to go, go.  Memories for a lifetime.  I treasure my Hat and Pin that I won there.

Having said that, I hosted and took two classes from Manny Bragg and got a lot of improvement from his drills and mindset.  Manny was much more, um, economical too.

If you are going to shoot and compete you will need to start reloading or make friends with someone that does.  Just a fact.  Dry fire does make a big difference as well.

Good luck,

Doug

[mrgoodwrench]

1 hour ago, DougCarden said:

I went to Bill Roger's class in the late 90s.  One of my shooting highlights in my LE career.  It is fast paced and they keep you moving all day, and you do gun handling and dry firing at night as well.  You WILL shoot a lot of ammo.  I was carrying a Beretta 92FS at the time in a security holster and it was a PITA as the 7 steel targets were at human reaction time.

IF you listen to them and use the concepts they teach you will improve immediately, and do well.  If you shoot with one eye closed it will be a long week, but I saw many people figure it out and improve quickly.

Military teams fly in and shoot for 10 days before deployment, so there is real world applications for what they teach there.  If you want to go, go.  Memories for a lifetime.  I treasure my Hat and Pin that I won there.

Having said that, I hosted and took two classes from Manny Bragg and got a lot of improvement from his drills and mindset.  Manny was much more, um, economical too.

If you are going to shoot and compete you will need to start reloading or make friends with someone that does.  Just a fact.  Dry fire does make a big difference as well.

Good luck,

Doug

Great feedback. Im going to start dry firing just ordered 2 ben stoger dry fire books and begin dry firing. Also i have the hornady lock n load ammo plant and plan to get it up and running soon. I know many prefer Dillon but i got the lock and load progressive free and added to it so thats what im going to run. Started reading the dry fire book last night and am excited to get practicing im going to start with 20-30 min a day and go from there as time permits. And i think i may still go check out the class in spring 2025 but we will see. Thanks all mike

[mrgoodwrench]

2 hours ago, cautery said:

Oops... sorry.  Emanuel "Manny" Bragg.  GM, instructor, past office holder, EXCELLENT instructor, and just one helluva guy. 

Thanks for clarifying