rvb

[rvb]

Shot production @ Ft Wayne, came in 2nd. Got schooled by Rob S.

This was my first match as MD, and our first match w/ Practiscore. Especially the first 1/2 of the match, making sure everything was running smooth was taking a lot of my focus. Everything was running smoothly, so I should have focused more on my shooting, but that's not where my head was at.

Shot a lousy 87 % of the points. probably 4-5% of that was due to not engaging two papers and a steel that didn't fall after 3 hits, but did fall in calibration.

My first stage was actually the only stage I won. There were a couple places I hesitated to remember where to go in my game plan, but was fairly happy with the shooting.

The second stage (3) sucked. I was going to be first shooter. As I was loading mags I found a bad round... it looked like it had excessive set-back and maybe no crimp, but I couldn't figure out how/why. Then I started questioning my box of ammo and whether I had screwed something up in the loading process. The question of "will my gun blow up when I pull the trigger" kept going through my head as I was shooting. I then forgot to engage a target... I was on pace to have a couple second lead on Rob but blew it w/ a 2M/FTE. I got a new batch of ammo to finish the match.

Stage 4 was a total gaming FU. started strong, but then the popper/activator didn't fall. Went to the target that was supposed to be available and it wasn't... went back and doubled the popper, still didn't fall. Decided to call for calibration... just walked to the next position and hit the remaining target. Well... the popper fell in calibration, I got the M on the steel and 2M FTE on the partially hidden target. Train. Wreck. I should have finished the stage strong and made sure I had all the hits incase the calibration failed, but I didn't. Stupid newb-ish mistake. Came in a whopping 30% of Rob on this one.

Stage 5 went ok, just a short speed shoot. Worst thing to comment on was getting a D due to starting to transition off to soon.

and 1 was decent, but not great. I changed my gameplan after the walkthrough, and I was hesitant in what targets to transition into and generally slow.

Classifier was 09-02 Diamond cutter. 6A/2C in 4.07 (8.8452 HF). The 2 Cs were both on T4 just straddling the corner of the Azone. Should come in about 84%. My slow and steady decline back into A class continues.....

I felt pretty good about the shooting portion of my match. My recoil control and shot calling felt back where it was pre-winter-break. My new contacts let me see the FS better. I have to fix my head game...

-rvb

[ZackJones]

It's tough to shoot and be MD at the same time. I'm the MD for our steel challenge matches which we score with PractiScore. Between setup/registration/etc I'm beat before the first buzzer goes off.

[Racer377]

Trying to run a match and shoot a match at the same time is tough thing to do, no question.

I'm still envious of your trigger speed.

[rvb]

Thanks guys. I have no doubt things will get better... just a lot of "first match jitters." I remember the first couple times I ran a timer for most of a match and the effect it had on my shooting... now it almost feels weird to not be running a timer.

If I had been smart, and not inclined to take on everything at once, I would have gotten a match or two under my belt as MD, then done the change to practiscore. But it all worked out.

The match seemed to run smooth, so once the shooter's meeting is over I need to just get into shooting mode and let the match run itself. I guess everytime we switch stages go pull the scores out of the squad tablets to keep things backed up should be the worst of it....

-rvb

[rvb]

Shot a decent match at Atlanta.

1st prod, 4th overall. 90% of the points.

Day starts off rough w a M on the first target... Really butchered that stage. 9rounds on the plate rack, 8 on the star.

Next two stages were classifiers.

Steely Speed VII, 06-10. 3.89s, 7.7121 HF. Classifiercalc shows it good for 91%. Won this stage in combined results

Down the Middle, 13-02, 40 points, 3.82s, 10.4712 HF. Classifiercalc shows it good for 100%.

The stage with the swinger I doubled the activator since the cable was stretched so tight between them and I saw the previous shooter have trouble getting it down. It was a safe plan that worked out pretty well.

The table start stage was interesting. A lot going on there you don't see all together... Unloaded gun, table start, retreating. A good stage just for the "different" factor.

The last stage, Triad, I shot another M. The two stages with the misses were the only ones I didn't win.

I need to work on partials, esp partial turtles. Those were my two misses. Trying to sneak into the A zone past a barrel. Had I just gone for the C, or even the A/C line I'd have come out way ahead...

I also need to work on large transition, esp on targets 15-25 yds. I felt like I was forever settling on the target.

-rvb

Edited May 26, 2014 by rvb

[rvb]

Lots of time at the range this weekend... actually feeling a little burned out on the place.

Friday spent about 3 hrs after work building my stage for the match.

Sat built some props and hauled some equipment to help setup time on sunday.

Sat I also got some practice in. Shot my best rifle groups yet. New contacts, adjusted scope position on rifle, and different grip to help where my finger sits on the trigger. best 5-shot group was .65" @ 100. A couple other groups were close to that size, except I had trouble avoiding a flyer (called) in each group. Ammo was the Fed Gold Medal Match 69s. Now to work up some handloads to match it...

I put an adjustable gas block on the AR, made a world of difference... it was so over-gassed...

Sat I also did some pistol practice. Worked on 1) shooting faster at mid-range targets (15 yds) and big transitions. Even some big transitions into partials. I'm starting to get my technique down better where I can work this glock trigger faster to get both the speed and accuracy. I was so over-aiming the farther and mid-range targets, even at the last thurs practice night. Suddenly it seems my control of the gun and trigger have leaped.

That carried over into the Ft Wayne match Sunday...

Won HOA w/ the production gun. No penalties, 3 Ds. 91.3% of the points. I really pushed myself on the far targets to keep my speed up and trust the technique changes I made would get the bullet to go where I wanted, and for the most part it worked out ok.

Stage 1 I had 2 Ds. One was on a 20yd array, the other was on a ~10 yd array through a barrel. I don't know why I didn't make them up, as I called them as D's or near the C/D line... I had one make-up on a ~15yd popper, but cleaned the plates that were ~15 yds. Won this stage over-all.

Stage 2 I should have been a couple seconds faster. I bobbled a slide-lock reload. had one make-up on a mini popper. had a hestitation shooting the last array as I had kicked my dropped mag during the reload and watched it sail downrange.... It was coming up right in line w/ my target and for a second I was afraid I was going to shoot it! haha. dropped to 5th over-all on this one.

Stage 3 was nothing great or bad. Was slow on some far, hard-lean partials. Stage plan may have bit me here some.

I shot Stage 4 (that I built) well... spectacularly, if I may say so myself. I couldn't have done it any faster, I pushed my foot speed and shooting speed as much as possible, and ended up with ALL As.

Classifier was 03-12, Ironsides. 7As, 5Cs, 9.62. Too many Cs, especially with the non-spectacular time. should come in at ~83%, which is no help....

Stage 5 was nothing great or bad. A "D" hit on this short course hurt a bit, but I was moving too fast to try to make it up.. it quickly disappeared behind a no-shoot...

-rvb

Edited June 16, 2014 by rvb

[driver8M3]

Stage 2 I should have been a couple seconds faster.

This is where Hendrix(-)2 really comes in handy.

[rvb]

Hey Russell!

You guys sure have come up w/ some funny ways to score your section match since I left!

Edited June 23, 2014 by rvb

[rvb]

Trying to get back into a routine of dryfiring....for months I've just been doing a night or two every couple weeks...

Last night was the first night back at it. I was awesome! haha.

The kids got me Stoeger's new Dry-Fire Training book for father's day, so hopefully some new drills and some agressive par goals to mix up the routine will help with some motivation issues. Just did the first few drills, but did a ton of reps for about an hr total. The good: Smashed the 25yd WH index drill w/ about a 1.4s par. The Bad: the reload drill was about 1.2s vs the 1.0 goal. The ugly: the 10yd transition drill was hurt by my poor draws... 1.8-2.0 against a goal of 1.6. Considering a 2.0 10yd bill drill is pretty solid for me in live fire, a 1.6 w/ transitions is pretty salty, but I know my problem is less w/ transitions than w/ draws on this drill.

index needs a lot of work. I keep adjusting my grip w/ this glock trying to find something that works. Lately I've been rebuilding my grip around the goal of being able to work the trigger fast and maintain a good clean break on 15 yd partials or 25yd plates. I was happy to see this was Ben's 2nd drill in his book (w/o a target).

will I keep at it this time?? Need to sign up for another major or something so I have some motivation....

-rvb

Edited June 23, 2014 by rvb

[rvb]

well I've failed at getting back into a dryfire routine, and it shows.

Shot the Ft Wayne match this weekend. 3rd in production (lost 2nd by 0.75 match points, just over 0.1%). Beat by GM and M. It was fun to have the tough competition.

trigger pulling wasn't aweful, shot 91.65% of the points, w/ 1 M and 1 D.

I lost a lot of time in just "choppiness." No stage really seemed to flow smoothly. Probably could have done a better job walking through and visualizing.

Worst stage was my first (stage 2). I barely did any walkthrough as I noticed a stage setup problem in the Nooks, so I had to go around to all the squads and get that fixed. Squad was nearly done before I even got my gear on. This is the stage I had the mike on. I gave up 25 match points on this stage to the 2nd place winner, so this stage cost me. Spent the rest of the match trying to dig out of that hole.

Classifier was 03-08 Madness. 9A/4C/1D in 8.39s for 6.9130 HF. Looks like it was bad enough to not count. Reload was pure crap, probably 2s or more and of course the D hurts (the last shot before the reload iirc)

-rvb

[rvb]

I actually dryfired tonight. First 1/2 dozen reloads completely missed the gun...

[rvb]

Won prod at the Atlanta match this weekend. It was a pure hoser "no" match (no steel or no shoots or partials, just close wide-open paper and 40-round courses).

I've long believed the hoser targets are where you NEED to get As, despite the temptation to go faster and accept less. I actually managed to put that idea into practice at this match. I really tried for As (but was really pushing my limit to accomplish that). I ended up w/ 188As and 36Cs (93.6% of the points) and no Ds or penalties.

Day started rough, I almost dropped my gun on a reload on my first reload of the match, and was shooting pure target focus for some reason... barely saw the sights... was just looking at the paper and watching the holes appear. I was about 3 seconds slower than I should have been (mainly from the reload fumble) and finished 4th/prod (only stage I wasn't 1 or 2).

Got my head back in it shot pretty consistent the rest of the day. The last stage I lost a couple seconds stepping out of the shooting area (foot rocked/slipped off the fault line, had to step back in, re-find the target, etc).

classifiers:

99-11 El Prez: 11A/1C in 5.96s, 9.7315 HF (Should be ~94.8%).

99-23 Front sight: 7A/5C in 5.19s, 9.6339 HF (too many Cs. ~75%).

-rvb

[rvb]

What kind of idiot completely revamps the way they are gripping and shooting the gun a week before one of their two major matches of the year?

I've really struggled to figure this glock out. Seems there is always something that keeps me from being happy w/ how I'm shooting it, either recoil control sucks or trigger control sucks or I get good groups but they are off target when shooting fast, or the slide just plain chews my hand up.

I kinda started at scratch and rebuilt my grip. So far (trick of the day?) things seem going well. I had my first validation of my dryfire in livefire practice last night. The sight tracked/returned much better than previously, and even at speed the rounds were landing well centered, not pushed left/right. And my hand isn't chewed up. The only real problem is it's now naturaly pointing a little higher than before so I've got some index issues to clean up.

I have the gun spun much farther counter-clockwise in my grip... much more parallel to the thumb; much more in-line w/ the forearm. It's now a loooong reach to the trigger (I had a couple draws I missed the trigger safety!) but I seem to be getting pretty good trigger control...

To help burn it in and see what parts I need to better ingrain, I did some 3-yd fast draws. They were all in the .61-.65 range, 3 As, a C, and a D. The D was my first and I totally resorted to my old grip and completely pulled the gun w/ the trigger. fixed it for the rest....

Did a modified walk-back drill w/ the group. Of 14 rounds fired at the upper A, only 3 fell out into the B (2 at 15 when I held under just a tick too far and 1 at 25. So accuracy w/ the new grip / trigger press seems ok. Didn't have time to do any real group shooting

also did a walk-back type group drill w/ draw and 2 rounds w/ a 2 second par. Was still at ~1.7 at 25.

reloads SUCKED. W/ the new grip, I'm doing weird things keeping the gun/mag from getting aligned. They were all in the ~1.4 +/- range.

I have some work cut out for me in the next week to improve my index, fix my reloads, and ingrain the new trigger press.

-rvb

[rvb]

IN Section:

Came in 5th of 89 in Production, 2nd Master. I think top IN resident in Prod?

With 18 stages, this was by far the biggest match I have shot. I've never shot over two days before, either. I think maybe 12 or so stages at an area match was the most I had shot previously.

I shot 90.5% of the points. 5 penalties (2M, 2NS, 1 xtra-shot Pen). The two Ms were both in hardcover on partials, not more than 1/8" from being a hit. I called one on the line but didn't have enough rounds to finish the array if I made it up and the other I called a couple inches higher and thought it would be good. the other 3 penalties came on stage 6, the WH standard. On the freestyle string I put one in the NS and made up the corresponding mike w/ an A, but also got the extra-shot penalty. On the WH string one round just touched the perf on a NS.

Except for the penalties, I was very happy w/ the performance.

Some things that stood out to me....

- I recovered from the stage 6 disaster and went on to get a 4th place finish on stage 7.

- On some stages I did a great job of shooting on the move and was able to be always shooting (when not reloading); on other stages I could have done much better at this (shot arrays flat footed).

- The week or two of heavy dryfire with the changes I made to my grip really paid off, I felt I had much better recoil control and sight tracking. Only once did I bobble my grip on the draw and go back to my old grip technique.

- I was able to be consistent (except stage 6) throughout all 18 stages. I think my worst failure to follow a plan was an extra un-planned reload, but I recovered well.

I have a lot to work on. I think one of the biggest things is setting up on hard positions (esp hard leans) and tight shots such as partials. I need to work on getting into position and getting those shots off sooner. A half second times several positions in a stages adds up to a couple seconds real quick. I also need to gain some confidence w/ this glock trigger on hard shots and eliminating the over-aiming. I did better at that this match, but still not where I want to be.

As a bonus, I won a gift cert for a Glock. Thanks to Glock for sponsoring the match and donating the prize! I'm thinking of getting something I can use for a limited gun.

made the local Louisville news:

http://www.wdrb.com/category/163829/fox-41-video?clipId=10578316&autostart=true

my match vid:

-rvb

Edited September 16, 2014 by rvb

[BillD]

Awesome Ryan! Nice to see you back on the range and doing so well. Well, it's nice your in Production also...

[rvb]

thanks, Bill!

[rvb]

Did some dryfire with the open gun last night....

You really need a perfect index to find that dot every time, and, well ..... it's been 5 yrs... enough said.

I found it after the draws ok, but was pretty hit or miss after reloads or movement.

reloads were a little off. I have to flip the 2011 more than the glock, so a couple times I missed the button. I also went ahead and moved my mag pouches back a little closer to my production position. I never ran them too far forward to begin with, but I kept going right past the first mag and reloading from the second.

Even with a new battery, the dot doesn't seem as bright in full sun as I remember. Maybe I'm just spoiled by aimpoints now. Speaking of which, I'm surprised folks haven't started running those micros on open pistols yet.......

missed a few draws from low ready. There's a lot more stuff on the back of the gun to get the thumb around vs a glock....

cleaned the bore for the 3rd or 4th time in the gun's life. I can't believe how good it still looks. I'm planning when I get to the range to build stages on either Friday or Sat to check the zero and run some timing drills or bill drills to re-learn how to control this thing.

Sunday's match could prove comical......

-rvb

[Corey]

We are gonna have to squad together this weekend

[rvb]

We are gonna have to squad together this weekend

sure thing, it's actually been awhile since we were on the same squad...

-rvb

[rvb]

Sunday's match could prove comical......

-rvb

"Monkey %$&@'ing a football" would best describe my first match with the open gun in 5 yrs....

Still, I don't think shooting 92+% of the points and finishing 87% of Truk was bad for being so rusty on it.

The good:

-- The gun worked 100% after sitting for 5 yrs. May need a new dot diode. We'll see if a good cleaning helps first....

-- By the end of the match, I was getting some timing back and was a little more in control of the dot, and was able to better call shots.

-- Stages 4, 5, 6 I had 2nd place finishes.

-- I shot a 79.75% on the classifier (99-10, Times Two. 9A, 3C in 6.68s, 8.5329HF). Good enough to make me feel ok about myself, not so good it will count and drag my % down.

The Bad:

-- Never once did I grab my front mag during a reload. I even moved the pouches back some, but I still went to my usual production mag pouch position.

-- After reloads or big movement where I broke grip to run, I had a very hard time finding the dot. Index is just not burned in yet. Stage 3, after my reload, I took 2 or 3 shots on steel hoping by just pulling the trigger it would help me find the dot. On Stage 2 after running from far left to middle of the stage I had a horrible re-grip and put a round off into a barrel, but was able to make it up.

-- I had a couple mikes. The first was most likely poor timing on the gun. It was my first stage and the dot was going everywhere, with TONS of dip. I suspect I threw it under the target, but I was having such trouble calling them with the dot going everywhere. Second was a miss into hardcover on a partial. Even w/ a couple extra make-up shots I only got one round in there....

-- I still shot like a production shooter in regards to where I was agressive and not.... ie I had it backwards. Especially my first couple stages I was too aggressive on the shooting speed, but not on the moving between arrays.

Being MD/RM/statsguy is hard on the shooting. I didn't really get to walkthrough on stage 1, just a couple quick looks between shooters. My plan/execution was a wreck. But as we get to the end of the season, I'm at least finding it less stressful and enjoying it more. Next season I'm going to have to work on keeping my mental focus on the shooting while dealing w/ the other distractions vs just being distracted all the time.....

-rvb

[rvb]

"Monkey %$&@'ing a football" would best describe my first match with the open gun in 5 yrs....

[CB45]

Looking good RVB! I hope you shoot Open next season!

[rvb]

Shot OPEN at the "outlaw" match at Warsaw (outlaw only because of some 1/2-size paper and 3" plates on a star). Won HOA by 20%.

Still made a lot of errors. Partially because I haven't built the necessary index yet and partly because I have to re-adjust my mindset and how I attack a stage (differences in stage planning and going to major).

First stage (5) I shot was all steel w/ the star w/ the 3" plates. I was happy w/ my shooting (I think only one extra shot and it was on the star), but I wrecked my stage time.... I forgot to reload! Turns out these open guns aren't like movie guns w/ unlimited ammo... So I got the dreaded click on the star then forgot to rack a round in so I came back up to a dead trigger. Probably a 2.5s mistake

Next stage (1) was all 1/2-size paper. Got slightly off my plan which forced me to shoot some stuff static vs on the move and cost me a good second or two. I had the agressiveness dial a little on the retard side as I shot 18Cs (of 44 rounds).

Stage 2 I don't recall any real blunders Gave up a few too many points but some of that was from Ds on each of the swingers. That was a tough array. This was probably my best stage.

Stage 3: Shot this one well, but again almost forgot my reload. Came back up w/ a poor index, had to hunt for the dot, and when I found it I didn't have the patience needed to get it on target and put a round into a NS on a partial. Called and made-up, but it hurt. Was very happy w/ the shooting on the move as I came into positions, even on the partials.

Stage 4: Super happy w/ my actual shooting. Only 1 C even pushing on the move. I'm pretty sure I was 1-for-1 on steel. Again got bit by poor index after a reload and had to hunt for the dot, probably cost me a second. Almost ran past a port and had to back up... probably another second.

Forgot how FUN this open stuff is.

-rvb

[Racer377]

It was good shooting with you!

It was not good for me to see an open gun that runs, though. That looks like more fun than should be legal.

[rvb]

Always good to shoot w/ you, too, bro.

It was a hoot, esp on those monster stages. I was planning to go back to prod next spring, but I was looking at my stash and started realizing I have enough components on hand to shoot open next yr. I also have this new limited gun on the way... decisions decisions.....

-rvb