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Posted

There's one of those 4-classifier matches coming up in my area, and I'm tempted to try shooting Production for a while.....I read with great interest the thread about shooting Open to improve, but I don't have a dot-gun, and don't really want one.

I'm thinking Production would be a good exercise in *really* making sure one gets the hits, and shoots accurately. The platform change wouldn't be a big deal, since I already am shooting a Glock....

Did those of you that have done/do this find it a worthwhile exercise? When you returned to Limited and/or L10, you improved? Thx

Posted

Not a bad idea. But remember that at the top levels, every division needs to shoot the highest points possible. If you are shooting Open or Limited (especially Open) you can't afford to be dropping more than 3 or 4 points a stage.

Posted

I think it is a great idea. Especially since it takes shooters so long to get/understand what Jake just said. Shooting Major, all too often, we get rewarded for non-Alpha hits.

Shooting Minor, there is no reward for non-Alphas.

Posted

I'd be hesitant to disagree with two mods in concert, but I think if you already shoot a G-lok you need to just learn to focus and shoot points. If it takes a move to minor and 10 rounds, so be it, but identify the problem and the fix, don't just change 'cuz you're bored.

By example, I hear folks all the time talk about going to L10 for a while to practice reloads. This bugs me, practice reloads at home, shoot Limited at the match so you still need to be creative and aggressive.

As to going to production, if major is hurting your focus or control, fine, shoot minor for a while and get back to basic. But I think you will lose something in the course cutting / flow of field courses if you stay too long.

Personally I would shoot more production if we went to LEGAL AVAILABLE high caps to allow for more creativity and options. I don't like the guns enough to overcome my distaste for reloading every time I change arrays without even thinking about it. Skinny guns; it's close. B)

Bottom line - You need to shoot whatever platform you run at roughly 95% of the points. how you get yourself to do that is open for discussion.

Posted

I really don't see how moving to Production and shooting the same platform can provide any training benefit. The only thing not making you get the hits now is your own mindset.

Posted
I really don't see how moving to Production and shooting the same platform can provide any training benefit. The only thing not making you get the hits now is your own mindset.

That's kinda what I was thinking. Going to a 10 round game just increases the number of things you have to think about. By all means do it for fun, but you can do the same thing where you are.

Posted

Some good points have been brought up.

Shooting Production, you will have more going on. You'll have to learn to look at stages from a viewpoint of a smaller mag capacity. You'll have more reloads to do. etc, etc...

You can, and should, be able to shoot those points in Major.

But, the pay value isn't there for a lot of shooters. They don't see the benefit from getting almost all the points on a stage (as Jake mentioned above).

Unless they have the benefit of competing with a top shooter (that gets point, fast), then they usually are rewarded by shooting Charlies. If so, that is what they will train themselves to do. Rewarding lessor hits.

YMMV...it could be a temperament thing. I like a rough road.

Posted

I found production has helped my shooting a little bit in that mindset.

At the local matches..i like to compete in the overall...and our scorekeepers are great to run out a result that shows all the divisions mixed for the stages and the match...so you can see the comparison..

shooting production is an exercise in making everything work..as you are shooting with the disadvantage of shooting minor, doing more reloads, and having not as an efficient plan as the Limited and Open shooters..

but competing in that realm of mixed divisions..your skill set becomes improved due to necessity if you want to improve in that arena..

so over the past few months..I find my practices working on improving to how to shoot the a-zone, how to transition, move, reload more efficiently, read a stage better..

just all skills that do translate over to the other divisions...

yes..it pretty much is a trick of the day...to gear the mental game to what is should be in the other divisions..but sometimes isn't due to the higher point rewards of lesser hits and the lack of doing as many reloads...

anyway..it may help...and it may not...

Posted

Production is DEFINITELY a different game than the others. 10 round capacity AND minor scoring makes a big difference. Take it from someone who made GM in Limited and was used to getting rewarded for non Alpha hits. When you shoot Prod, you lose twice as many points as shooting Major and they add up reeeaaaallll quick!!

In a 24 round stage, if you're down 5 in major, OK, not bad, no biggie, but in Prod, you're down 10!! Big difference. D's are a killer, basically, I consider the D a no penalty miss.

Now, shooting and diagnosing 10rd stages is definitely different than shooting full capacity. It doesnt enable you to take chances as much and have a few extra rounds for steel or extra shots, b/c you wont have the extra rounds. For me, diagnosing/gaming stages w/ 10rds is completely different. Mainly for this reason, I picked Sevigny to win Lim10 Nats a month before they ever shot (and Ive got proof :) haha).

I picked him for the fact that he is an incredible shooter, but he is used to diagnosing/gaming stages with 10 rds and knowing what risks he can get away with and not, when to chance it and when not to. I know all the other shooters are GM's as well and used to shooting their 1911's, but there is a difference in gaming 10 rd stages. Dave is used to looking at a stage and diagnosing it with 10 rds, nothing more. The other GM's are not used to diagnosing stages with 10 rds except when they shoot Lim10, which is what, couple times a year. Dave does it almost all the time, unless he is shooting Limited.

Posted

just to be different, I found shooting production made me a better open shooter. I had gotten sloppy in my shooting and re-loading, kind of taking the dot, huge magwell and light trigger pull for granted, which of course resulted in mikes, blown re-loads etc.

production forced me to concentrate on my re-load drills, sight picture etc, just started to get serious about open again, still pushing too hard, but at least I haven't launched a mag across the range in a while.

Posted

Hmm...Some very good comments, and I'll think about this for a while.

I am starting to appreciate the value of points. Looking at the results of last week's Fl Open, the top Limited shooters had both time AND points. They were shooting ~150 out of 160 points on a stage. And quickly.

I know that, but I'm still on the edge of REALLY knowing it, and I'm thinking Production and its minor scoring would push me over, where the pain threshold of not getting points is higher in the typical club match.

And I guess I am thinking of it as a trick-of-the-day, as EERW suggests, where after shooting Production for a bit, I can come storming back in LTD, and the targets will seem huge and the magazines bottomless. :)

The other positive, is that Production is very popular at some area matches, here, and it would give me a chance to compete against more shooters....

OTOH, I'm far from bored, and there's something to be said for not scattering my attention and focus...Thx all.

Posted

I feel your biggest benefits from production will come from learning to better break down stages and insure your hits on steel you can't take a ton of makeup shots when you only have 10 rounds.

Posted

I spent the last 6 months shooting production. I switched from limited because I could not force myself to work on getting the points. I was focused on speed and the result was I got sloppy. Now I've switched back to limited and it seems to have helped. I'm focusing on shooting for the "A" on the target, not just shooting brown. I think that Travis or someone like that said somewhere that each division will help improve something different about your performance. The only way to know is to give it a try. I know that I started focusing for the alpha after I saw that speed alone would kill me in production. Now the question is will that focus last?

Posted

Boo,

It can't hurt, try it a while. If it doesn't help you will know to do something different to make that "Change".

I went from Limited to Revolver and shot it exclusively for 2 years.....If you want to learn how to make all the bullets count in the gun then go to the wheel....Misses KILL...they usually cause a standing reload that was not planned and then that gets in your head about all the time you're waisting ect. You learn real quick........HIT WHAT YOU'RE AIMING AT!!!

Since I switched back to Limited due to a tendon problem agrivated by the wheelgun(about 4 months) I somehow managed to make Master in Ltd.

NOW how do you make Master in Limited in 4 months and shooting maybe 8 or 10 matches after shooting a revolver for 2 years prior?

The wheelgun teaches you to HIT WHAT YOU ARE AIMING AT!!!!!

A little secret known by the side feeders(wheelgunners) but not told to bottomfeeders(autoshooters).

Hell even TGO is shooting a wheelgun now.....It can't be that bad. :P

HOPALONG

Posted
NOW how do you make Master in Limited in 4 months and shooting maybe 8 or 10 matches after shooting a revolver for 2 years prior?

The wheelgun teaches you to HIT WHAT YOU ARE AIMING AT!!!!!

HOPALONG

Hopalong, I hear what you're saying, but that's a little bit TOO radical of a change. And then I'd have to start reading all the weird stuff in the Revolver group. :blink:

I tried messing around with my G22 tonight, and a Bladtech belt holster. Felt like I was drawing out of my armpit; felt terrible.

The hell of it is, too, I have two nice 1911's just collecting dust now that I started shooting a Glock -- a Kimber and Les Baer PII. Maybe this would be a good time to dust them out, and get 4 good L-10 classifiers, but then I might start liking a metal gun again, and....Bah.

Funny how you suddenly have too *many* things to shoot. Thank god I've avoided 3-gun so far.

Posted (edited)

+1 on Hop's post.

I've been shooting revolver almost exclusively for the last two years. Everything seems easier after shooting revolver for a while. There's nothing like shooting double action with only six rounds to make you go back to the fundamentals.

I couldn't dig myself out of limited B class to save my life. Then I was talked into shooting revolver and made revolver A class in a little over one year. I would occasionally shoot other guns at some matches and shortly later I made "A" in limited shooting a stock Glock 35. And then a few months later I made "A" in production using a stock Glock 17.

But then again, there's always the possiblity that I have improved simply because I have been practicing more these last couple years. <_< When I did practice, it was with the revolver for the most part.

Edited by Keith
Posted

I've been shooting limited for quite some time now and decided to switch to lim10 this year.

Right or wrong, my mindset was that Limited is all about speed.

I would gladly sacrifice a few alphas to gain a few seconds on the clock.

The interesting part about going back to lim 10 is that you really have to focus on your strategy as well as shot placement.

I approach every stage as if it were Virginia count.

You simply can't wast ammo taking multiple shots at steel and make-up shots on swingers, etc.

When you miss steel you either have to let it go or make a mag change at a place you hadn't planned.

Otherwise you run your gun dry as I have done a couple of times.

Now your game plan is out the window.

I really think that when I go back to limited this is going to help me.

We'll see.

Tls

Posted

Just my observation, but the top guys in Production at the World Shoot shot the same amount of A's C's and D's as the top dogs in Standard.

Also, minor scoring will not make you shoot more A's. Aiming for the A will make you shoot the A. I can't see why you couldn't just do that with your current gear :)

Posted

It's just mindset.

Some view minor as an accuracy game and major as a speed game.

Some view 10 rounds (or less) as needing to be careful, and hicaps as having plenty of extra.

You gotta do what you gotta do to rattle the tree.

Posted
It's just mindset.

You gotta do what you gotta do to rattle the tree.

Well...was planning on shooting Production, but have had some serious ammo/650 woes, and didn't trust any of the 350 rounds I had loaded up, and at the last minute decided to pull out my Kimber .45acp, and shoot L-10 for the 4 classifiers.

Botched both the mandatory reloads on the first classifier. Shot the next two more or less about where I'm shooting LTD -- very low "B" average -- and crashed-and-burned on the last classifier. Didn't do particularly well on the field courses, either, but I can't blame the gun for that....

I'm thinking Glock or single-stack, Production, Limited or L10, Open, or whatever, I need to be shooting *in control*, period. And at my level, I'm probably better off worrying about that exclusively, before monkeying with changing guns, rigs and divisions.

Kind of a bummer. I had this vision of 4 spectacular classifiers -- whoa! stand back -- but one is what one is, to paraphrase Popeye.

Posted
I'm thinking Glock or single-stack, Production, Limited or L10, Open, or whatever, I need to be shooting *in control*, period. And at my level, I'm probably better off worrying about that exclusively, before monkeying with changing guns, rigs and divisions.

Bingo, at ANY level I think you are right...

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