How often and how long do you?

[scribble]

I am wondering how many times a week and for how long a period do people Dryfire. I know there are some like PB who probably crush others averages but just looking for some feedback.

[HSMITH]

A year ago I spent about two months, 30-40 minutes a day, 4 or 5 days a week. It helped, a lot. If you have the time it is well worth it as long as the dryfire is productive. Steve Anderson's books are invaluable to someone like me that NEEDS structure to make dryfire productive.

[scribble]

A year ago I spent about two months, 30-40 minutes a day, 4 or 5 days a week. It helped, a lot. If you have the time it is well worth it as long as the dryfire is productive. Steve Anderson's books are invaluable to someone like me that NEEDS structure to make dryfire productive.

When you dryfire do you pick out certain sections of his book or do you just do a few reps of the entire book. I currently only have the 1st one.

[Jman]

Use the book front to back the first few weeks. 30 min 5 times a week. Then go back and hit your weak areas.

Jim M

[HSMITH]

I did mainly just the drills I could do in a bedroom. Too lazy to clean out an area in the basement to do much movement and it was winter so the garage was out...

[Putty]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGH! Boo dryfire. Ok, I gotta go do it now....<beep> click <beep>

[boz1911]

Up to and including 4 minutes at a time. Sorta like watching paint dry. Also why there may be a "B" by my name for a long time.

[AWLAZS]

I have been dryfiring twice a day. I usually spend an hour or more at it each time. I use Steves book and run through the basic classifier drills. I then pick and choose drills from the back of the book for the remainder of my time.

In the evening I have more space I warm up with Steves #1 drill move to Burkett reloads then 6 on 6.

After that I work on movement drills from the match skills section.

Dry fire helps me quite a bit. Things like draws and reloads are smoother and faster without that rushed or "trying" feeling.

I have never really paid much attention to how I move. A friend has been recording me at matches. Watching myself move around a stage is very helpfull in deciding how I spend my dryfire time.

[HoMiE]

A year ago I spent about two months, 30-40 minutes a day, 4 or 5 days a week. It helped, a lot. If you have the time it is well worth it as long as the dryfire is productive. Steve Anderson's books are invaluable to someone like me that NEEDS structure to make dryfire productive.

When you dryfire do you pick out certain sections of his book or do you just do a few reps of the entire book. I currently only have the 1st one.

I try do the 1-13 drills everytime I dryfire. Try to get in dryfire 3-4 times a week. When I go live fire or shoot a match, I try to do about 50 practice draws, 15 hands at side, 15 surrender, 10 SHO, 10 WHO. Sometimes I can get through those first drills in 30 minutes, sometimes an hour. Use the full par time, make sure everything feels right to you, grip/stance/index, a mirror to watch yourself helps.

[JThompson]

I like to shoot... I shoot for fun... Dryfire is like watching paint dry.

Zero

[Chris Keen]

What is this "dryfire" thing I am always hearing folks talk about ?

[HSMITH]

And if you really want to see how screwed up you are video yourself and watch that....

[Chris Keen]

[scribble]

And if you really want to see how screwed up you are video yourself and watch that....

Yeah I did that, I sent them to Jay and he showed me ALLOT of things I was doing wrong. I think just getting the feedback alone is going to help me in my shooting. I hope that the dryfire will help me progressive more in this sport. I am taping my dryfire practices as well to see if I am doing things poorly or lazy.

[Johann the Horrible]

I dry-fire every day until I am so hot and sweaty that I cannot continue. With the temperatures we are experiencing at the moment that does not take so long. Maybe in our winter it will be more bearable and maybe I will practice for longer than 30 minutes at a time.

[Micah]

Good question

Dryfiring not only sharpens the economy of motion in your skill sets, but allows you to breed familiarity with many of the other aspects of the shooting, especially your equipment. I dryfire with eyes and ears, and with the internet radio up quite loudly. Now I'm able to shut out EVERYTHING but the timer, and can better focus on hearing the B in BEEP. After evaluating what my opportunity skill sets were, I then chose what drills to do. Eventually I developed my own drills to further strengthen the skills that were once weaknesses.

Not every drill needs to be the same hands at sides dance. Draw from an elbows locked surrender...hands on barricade...holding a ball...sitting in a chair...whatever! The more you practice the weird things, the more you will focus on what's most important: Getting to the shooting!

I do the daily dryfire thing in my garage (el dojo) because it is the closest, cheapest range around. If you have a range in your home, and you want to become a better shooter, is there really any reason why you aren't practicing?

[Jay870]

I do anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes, 4 to 5 times a week.

One maybe somewhat unique thing I do is dry-fire between sets while I'm lifting weights. I think it has helped me significantly, especially with reloads. When I'm sucking wind, with my shoulders screaming and my arms feeling like 100lbs each there is no way I'm smacking in reloads based soley on muscle memory and indexing. It forces me slow down and see the mag coming into alignment with the mag well, instead of just doing endless reps based on feel.

[Forester]

I make a solid effort at it for at least an hour and a half 5 days a week. I focus mainly on fundamentals in dryfire; draws, transitions and reloads get the most work. I have limited space in the basement where I am setup so right now movement is minimal. I focus on movement in and out of positions more in live fire practice.

Drills 1-13 in SA's book get the most work. I pick and choose other drills that focus on areas I am weak on. I always do the basics though, especially SHO/WHO.

One thing that has helped me with the SH/WH stuff is to take a head shot sight picture with either hand, take two "shots" and then transition to another target, again and again and again until you can no longer hold the sights in alignment. Time yourself with a stopwatch and try and work your times up. I find not only is it a decent isometric workout for each arm but as you get tired you have to focus more on the front sight and your trigger pull. Using a headshot means you have to do things right or the sights will dip out of the box.

[bgary]

I've committed to daily dry-fire time, generally about 45 minutes at a time.

I'm mostly working on core fundamentals right now, so I'm staying pretty close to drills 1-13 in Steve Anderson's book. I'll be adding movement drills as soon as the back yard dries out a little.

As an aside... I'm a feedback junkie, and I'm starting to struggle with keeping my drill-time "interesting". At the gym, I have performance metrics... I can keep myself motivated by pushing myself to run a little longer or a little faster than last time, or do a few more reps than last time, or whatever. It is "quantifiable and objective". I'm having a hard time finding that same level of feedback in my dry-fire routines... first, because it is somewhat subjective ("was that *really* a top-quality draw? Did I *really* have an optimal sight picture? Did I *really* acquire the sight picture before the second beep?"), and, because it is hard (at least for me) to find ways to "track improvement". I mean... I can tell whether I did 10 good repetitions of the drill within the par-time. But other than setting a new/lower par-time, I'm wrestling with how to make the execution *itself* better.

Not sure that makes any sense. Bottom line is, I'm wrestling with how to keep my dry-fire drills interesting and challenging and ever-more-productive use of my time.

B