Lots of things

[Limitless13]

Hi everyone,

I'm fairly new to the shooting sports. This weekend I have my first USPSA classifier, and am greatly looking forward to it. The plan is slow and clean. No mikes, no dq's. Anyway, I'm interested in getting some competition training. Are there any GM's in the St. Louis/Southern Illinois area? I'm hoping to get a good class in and have my technique analyzed. Other than that, do you have any recommendations for anything really? I'm just trying to soak up as much as I can at this point.

Thanks ahead of time!

LL13

[JakeMartens]

Hi everyone,

I'm fairly new to the shooting sports. This weekend I have my first USPSA classifier, and am greatly looking forward to it. The plan is slow and clean. No mikes, no dq's. Anyway, I'm interested in getting some competition training. Are there any GM's in the St. Louis/Southern Illinois area? I'm hoping to get a good class in and have my technique analyzed. Other than that, do you have any recommendations for anything really? I'm just trying to soak up as much as I can at this point.

Thanks ahead of time!

LL13

Manny Bragg is lives in Missouri, not sure if he has any classes set up around there or not, here is his email address

eb@protechco.com

[chirpy]

Check out the USPSA web site and use the club finder option. If there is a club close you might find someone there to help with what you want to do or can hook you up with someone.

Good luck and have fun.

[Flexmoney]

The plan is slow and clean.

Planning to shoot slow? Why put speed (fast or slow) first?

How about just...planning to shoot clean ?

Get in touch with Manny. You are lucky to have him in your back yard.

[FranDoc]

Welcome to the obsession. Keeping up with the slope of the learning curve can be like 'drinking from a firehose'.

Good training is priceless. Check the 'class announcements' threads on this Forum, also ask around locally, and follow the advice of the posts above.

Kyle ("Flexmoney", above) refers to one thing that we all wrestle with -- speed - or perceived speed - vs. accuracy. There's lots discussed here on that topic. Use the Forum search function; start with "speed focus" and see where it takes you from there.

I'll share the bit of advice that I got from a local GM: he was RO for one of my first stages at my first Sectional match. It was pretty obvious that I was new, so he asked what my plan was for the stage/match. I mumbled something about 'slow' and 'no mistakes' (sound familiar? Made sense to me, at the time).

His advice: "2 Alpha" ... on each target, as you go through each stage ... 2 Alpha.

Period.

Subtle difference in focus between "2 Alpha" and 'no mistakes/Mike's/DQ'.

Good luck. Hope you have a GREAT time at your first match.

[Limitless13]

Welcome to the obsession. Keeping up with the slope of the learning curve can be like 'drinking from a firehose'.

Good training is priceless. Check the 'class announcements' threads on this Forum, also ask around locally, and follow the advice of the posts above.

Kyle ("Flexmoney", above) refers to one thing that we all wrestle with -- speed - or perceived speed - vs. accuracy. There's lots discussed here on that topic. Use the Forum search function; start with "speed focus" and see where it takes you from there.

I'll share the bit of advice that I got from a local GM: he was RO for one of my first stages at my first Sectional match. It was pretty obvious that I was new, so he asked what my plan was for the stage/match. I mumbled something about 'slow' and 'no mistakes' (sound familiar? Made sense to me, at the time).

His advice: "2 Alpha" ... on each target, as you go through each stage ... 2 Alpha.

Period.

Subtle difference in focus between "2 Alpha" and 'no mistakes/Mike's/DQ'.

Good luck. Hope you have a GREAT time at your first match.

Guys,

Thanks for the advice. I should know better than to focus on the negatives ( i.e. slow and no mikes ) all that psychology in my past schooling must not have done much good. I absolutely see the point about shooting clean and shooting alphas. Recently in a local match I made that my focus and went from the bottom 40% of my previous match to the top 40% this past week. Positive training leads to positive results. Thanks for reminding me of that.

Also, thank you for the tip on Manny. I will be emailing him here in the morning about the possibility of some training.

I'm very much looking forward to this weekend even if there's storms and rain. Should make it a trip!

Thanks again,

LL13

[Limitless13]

Hey everyone,

The match this weekend went very well by my opinion. The weather was cold and windy, but the overall feeling of the match was very upbeat. I reshot one of the stages because I had two mikes, but aside from that stage, the rest were very clean, only one or two D's the whole day, and only 4 mikes total. All in all, I'm extremely happy with my performance.

In regards to the mikes, one of the higher class shooters suggested that I may be going too quickly while trying to shoot around the barricades. We had to squat/kneel under a beam to shoot under/to the side, and that put myself and my gun at about a 45 degree angle. I've noticed in some of my weekly indoor matches that I seem to have a problem with this. He said that I wasn't waiting for the sights to settle before I fired my second shot and such, pushing my shots to the left (while shooting on the left side). Again, I've had difficulty here in the past. Any suggestions? I plan to build a PVC barricade this week to train on.

Now, fortunately, and unfortunately to my wallet, I am absolutely firmly addicted. Anyone know where to find a used Dillon to feed my need for ammo?

Thanks, hope everyone had a good weekend.

LL13

[Flexmoney]

Did you shoot any Alphas?

[Limitless13]

Did you shoot any Alphas?

Yup, a bunch of them actually.

[Flexmoney]

What did you see while shooting the Alphas?

[mdstihl]

And why did you only mention the mikes and D's?

[Limitless13]

And why did you only mention the mikes and D's?

Haha, you guys are killing me. On the alphas I had a good sight picture nearly everytime. I say nearly because I can't remember them all on the last stage (texas stars are fun). I mentioned the Mikes and D's because I was thinking positively about how few of them I had. Or some BS like that.

Ok... On to my lessons learned and other random jibber jabber.

Shooting around barricades. - I have found that I tend to throw shots wide and left, while myself am wide and left. I have since built a PVC barricade in my garage to work with.

Shooting glasses that are bright are a must. - Halfway through the day I changed from my polarized lenses to my yellow ones. This made a HUGE difference in my being able to see my front. (Any suggestions on what type/style of glasses to use here?)

Nike ACG's are good, but Nike cleats are better. - It was a muddy, wet day, and though there wasn't a lot of moving in said mud. There was enough for me to have grabbed my cleats instead.

Thinking outside the box. - Just because everyone is doing it one way, doesn't mean it's the most progressive or efficient. I matched the fastest shooter on a stage just by minimizing my movement.

Equipment is good, Practice is better. - Had the opportunity to watch a lot of shooters, some with gear that makes me drool. Not all of the time did the gear seem to be the biggest problem. (A simple observation, but an interesting one to look at in person.)

Mindset, Mindset, Mindset. - Focusing on the good instead of the bad. (Thanks Flex and others.) Being it was a long drive to the range, I spent most of it running through drills in my head through to success each time. This helped me stop my initial fears of reloads without a well and just trust my body to do what it does, and lo and behold, it did. (I generally shoot with a well on my gun, but had to remove it before the match because of becoming loose without time to fix it.) Also, a match is a match is a match, classifier, standard, hose'em, free for all, they're all the same and should be treated the same. As fast as I can while shooting A's.

Shooters are some of the nicest people alive. - Maybe I was just extremely fortunate, but everyone was very welcoming and helpful throughout the whole day and I have already been exchanging emails with a number of the guys from the weekend.

This one's more of a question. Electronic Muffs, what's the big deal? I personally get more sound protection from double plugging. Am I missing something amazing here? I have a pair at home collecting dust because it felt they didn't provide nearly enough protection.

Ok, that's the short list.

On to some other things. I've been keeping a log with me to note certain aspects that I need to train that haven't yet thought of. One for instance was pulling a handle with my gun hand which activates a target and reaching for my gun off a table. Stuff like that goes in. Any other tips and suggestions to go into the ole' book?

Anyway, sorry for the long post. Thanks for the tips and advice guys. Hope everyone is having a good week so far.

LL13

Edited April 15, 2008 by Limitless13

[LPatterson]

This one's more of a question. Electronic Muffs, what's the big deal? I personally get more sound protection from double plugging. Am I missing something amazing here? I have a pair at home collecting dust because it felt they didn't provide nearly enough protection.

For me the object is not to completely block all sound but to be able to converse with other shooters while still blocking/lowering the sound of the gun shot. As an RO I need to hear if a shooter comes to the line and wants to know what the start position is, after a briefing and 5 shooters. Or that infrequent pop that signals a squib as the open/limited shooter is trying to clear the gun for another shot. I've seen GM's both ways so it is a matter of preference.