g34's range diary

[Flexmoney]

I learned a few things from yesterday's match. [...]

1) Don't try and shoot an IPSC turtle target at over 15 yards on the move.

Yeah...that might be pushing it. Your vision and experience will tell you that. (So, keep going with your vision and be careful not to make a hard and fast rule on target difficulty and distance.)

2) If half of the A zone is covered by hard cover, it is better to aim left of the A zone and get two C's than to aim center of the unobstructed A zone and take two Mikes.

Half the A-zone...that could be a tough one. I really hate taking 2 Charlies with minor though.

It looks like you have the accuracy to hit what you want. So, it does come down to risk vs. reward. This is one of the few cases where I'd actually go to hit factor math (usually hit factor math just tells me what I already know...to shot Alphas). If this were a close target (I assume it was, since they covered half the Alpha)...and I was setup solid for it...and it wasn't a quick entry or exit target...and the hit factor was low enough... ... I'd have to do the math to see how much time those 4 (possible) points were worth and what my likelihood of hitting those points would be.

I typed all that just so you keep an open mind and don't come away with a "this is how you always do it". As you say though...down 4 sure does beat down 30.

3) Always use your sights on close targets.

Heeey...there is more of that "vision" stuff.

You might start thinking about "un-rooting" yourself from the start positions a juuust bit sooner. I always want to get out of the start position as soon as possible...because the clock can't stop until I get to the last position and I can't get there any sooner by standing in one place too long. I realize that a lot of that stage design has you kinda stuck. I think I am trying to plant the seed that you might be aware of how hard/soft you are set up in various places through out the courses of fire.

Again...looking real solid.

Keep with that vision !

[g34]

Thanks for all of the useful information. On the first stage from the video in April, I decided to turn to the left because the 180 was not parallel with the pvc on the ground. It was closer to the targets on the left, so you would have to draw very carefully to not break the 180. I hope that makes sense.

Remember those points when you shoot the classifiers!

This is something I really need to work on. I feel like I shoot better than my current classification, but just can't seem to really nail any classifiers. I either go too slowly with all A's, or too quickly with too many C's. I guess this just takes time and lots of dry fire.

Thanks,

Kevin

[Flexmoney]

...to really nail any classifiers. I either go too slowly with all A's, or too quickly with too many C's.

Lots of folks get hung up shooting them like they are "classifiers".

They are just another stage in the match. Once you treat them like that, they fall into place more often than not.

Did you ever see that classic basketball movie...Hoosiers ? They are a small town team that goes to the State Championship. They walk into the "big" gym and their eyes go wide open. The coach has them measure the basket, the distance to the foul line, etc. It's all the same as every other basketball hoop, of course.

All they have to do is focus on executing the fundamentals.

Just shoot.

You will do well.

[g34]

I shot a match this Sunday and felt pretty good about my shooting. I felt smooth and accurate, but I completely tanked the classifier and lost over a hundred match points on the week handed shooting. I tried to be efficient in my movement and I also tried to engage targets as soon as I could while entering a shooting position. On two stages I had all alphas, so I think it would be beneficial for me to speed up some. Any thoughts on this?

is the video. As usual, all advice is greatly appreciated.

-Kevin

[Flexmoney]

Just because you shoot all Alphas, that doesn't necessarily mean you shot too slow. Dave Sevigny always impresses me with the hits he gets. Not only does he shoot Alphas, his hits look like two snake-eyes and are right in the middle of the Alpha zone.

However, you may have been standing on the brake pedal...holding yourself back.

All that speed thinking can go away when you let your vision drive your shooting.

[g34]

On Saturday, I live fire practiced. I spent a lot of time working on bill drills, draws, and strong and weak hand shooting. After shooting the bill drills, I realized that I really need to work on my surrender draws. They averaged about 1.4 seconds which really killed my times. My average time for a bill drill was about 2.6 seconds, so I have lots of improvement to make. I had some hands at sides draws that were in the .7's for a hit on paper at 8 yards. I know my actual draw in a match is much slower, so I would like to be able to get them down to about .85. I decided to video my face while I was shooting to see if I was blinking, because I can't seem to track the sights as well as some people describe. I usually see the sight lift, and then settle back into the notch without seeing much in between. I am not blinking, according to the video, so are the any other factors that could cause this? Also, I had a chance to chronograph my ammo, and am shooting just under 140 PF, but have no problem with the recoil, so I think I'm just going to leave my load like it is.

On Sunday I shot a match and had a great time. The stages were fun and challenging. I will post results and video later. On the last stage of the match, I had a bit of a scary experience. The stage was designed so that you could either zig zag left and right, or go down one side of the stage and then come back on the other. I decided I would do the latter. I told the RO that I would be coming backwards to engage the targets on the left side of the stage after engaging the ones on the right. So after shooting the right side of the stage, I retreated and shot an array of targets through a port. I then went farther back to engage the last array through another port. I shot one of the targets and then went to shoot the last one when I realized the RO was a few feet in front and to the right of me partly behind a wall. I stopped shooting, and put my gun into the port pointing away from the RO. He walked behind me, told me I would get a reshoot, told me to unload, and then he walked away. I was not given the if clear, hammer down, holster command. I yelled something to the RO to finish ROing me, but he didn't hear me. I then noticed that people were getting close to the 180 and were about to start taping targets down range, so I pointed my gun with the slide locked back about three feet in front of me at the ground and shouted that the range is not clear and I nead an RO. This is when I finally got an RO and hammer downed and holstered. On my reshoot, I shot it in a zig zag fashion, to avoid another incident. But, should I have holstered my gun when I noticed people were heading down range? I've never been in a situation like that, and was kind of in shock and didn't know what to do.

[Flexmoney]

You probably did the right thing in keeping the gun pointed in a safe direction and not doing any more "gun handling" than needed. I imagine that the RO was a bit shaken up by the experience.

On the vision, a lot of shooters don't always see the front sight through the whole recoil. Seeing it lift and seeing it come back is important. I wouldn't get too overly caught up in what you are "suppose" to see. Maybe open up a bit and notice some more about what what all you are actually seeing. (See more stuff and acknowledge as much of what you see as you can.)

Your hands-up draw...sounds like your are leaving the weak-hand hanging, while the strong hand goes to the gun. Make sure to move that weak hand toward the gun in conjunction with the strong.

[g34]

[g34]

Here is the

from yesterdays match. Please critique my shooting.

Here are the results:

Place Name USPSA Class Division PF Lady For Age Points Mtch%

1 HIDALGO, DANIEL FY29304 A Production Minor N N 459.9064 100.00%

2 FITZPATRICK, KEVIN A61677 C Production Minor N N Junior 458.9360 99.79%

3 JOUETTE, JEREMY A64276 C Production Minor N N 436.5169 94.91%

4 ROME, BLANE A65899 U Production Minor N N 382.9162 83.26%

5 LANDRY, ROBBIE TY50317 B Production Minor N N 347.1169 75.48%

6 CORNWELL, KEN A65429 U Production Minor N N 344.3665 74.88%

7 INGRAM, CHUCK A50459 C Production Minor N N Super Senior 342.5340 74.48%

8 PIERCE, RAY TY49182 U Production Minor N N 327.1192 71.13%

9 BOOTH, RICHARD TY52988 C Production Minor N N 308.9062 67.17%

10 HALL, ANDY A53123 B Production Minor N N 295.3982 64.23%

11 BESHONER, EDDIE A62340 D Production Minor N N 262.6119 57.10%

12 LEBLANC, BRUCE A61303 C Production Minor N N 252.3455 54.87%

13 LOCKWOOD, ROBERT Pen U Production Minor N N 239.3926 52.05%

14 CARR, CHAD Pen U Production Minor N N 218.4112 47.49%

15 BURT, SAM Pen U Production Minor N N 215.9042 46.95%

Printed: 07/26/2009 4:33 PM

[Dan Hefta]

G34,

You won't be stuck in C class for long if you keep shooting like you are. Looking good

[REmmons]

good shooting, I'm impressed, i don't have near the experience you do to critique but was curious what holster your using as well as load info. thanks i'm just getting into USPSA shooting

[g34]

REmmons,

Welcome to the Brian Enos forum. You will learn a lot of useful info here.

Load data:

147 gr. Montana Gold CMJ

3.6 gr. TG

1.130 OAL

140 Power Factor

This is a little hotter than most people load for minor, but I like the insurance of not going sub minor, and It's what I've been using for a while and don't feel like changing it.

Holster:

Blade Tech DOH(Dropped and Offset Holster) it's one of the most popular production holsters.

-Kevin

[shooterready]

Kevin,

I would rethink your PF. Dropping that 147 bullet to about 134k would help with sight recovery. Your splits would definitely get a tad quicker. Down side is you'll have to work on timing a bit with the new load.

Don't be afraid to change, change is good, you learn from what doesn't always work.

Keep it up! You're a great shooter with what looks like raw talent. I really like your drive and dedication. My son is 9 and has been shooting since 5 1/2. I only hope he keeps up his game as you are. He's already started shooting multi-gun with me.

[CHA-LEE]

In your next live fire practice do some testing with transitions on targets that are close to one another but at different heights. On one of your video's you posted the stage had a pyramid of targets somewhat blocked by barrels. It looked like you engaged the targets in an up and down order. I know for me I am able to "pick up" the next target visually easier if it is above or to the left of the target I am currently engaging. So I usually tend to start engaging groups of targets at the lower right if I have the option of shooting them in any order and it isn't screwing up my movement through the stage.

If I shot that same pyramid stage I would start with the lower right target and shoot all of the bottom ones from right to left finishing up with the steel on the left. Then swing over and pick off the right hand steel and sweep through the top row of targets from right to left. Of course its hard to tell how blocked the targets were or if there was a mandate to change shooting positions. It looked like you were moving between boxes but we can’t really see in the video.

I am not saying you are doing it wrong, just giving you something to think about on target engagement order.

Other than that, if you turn your “seeing” up a little bit then your shooting will speed up as well. I have found that my foot speed is usually limited to my shooting speed. When I shoot faster, my movement while shooting usually speeds up on its own. So don’t worry about moving faster as that usually comes automatically. Work on seeing faster to allow your shooting to happen faster and everything else should fall in behind it. The vast majority of time during a stage run is consumed by shooting and not so much by moving. The sooner you can get done with the current target the sooner you can get to the next target and so on. An eye opening example of how much time I consumed by shooting is by timing yourself simply WALKING through a stage as you point your finger at the targets and call out the shots very deliberately. Simply walk along as you would move through the stage going “pow..pow……….pow..pow” for the targets in your mind. You will be shocked to find that doing what you think is a very generous and deliberate dry walk through run on the stage is 2 – 4 seconds FASTER than when you shoot it and haul ass between shooting positions. Speeding up the shooting aspect of the stage greatly reduces the stage time. But as always you need your hits to be solid or the extra speed is just a waste of points. Points are king, but shooting fast while collecting maximum points should also be a top priority.

You are shooting really good. Keep up the good work and in the end, it really just comes down to practice. The more you practice the better you will get.

[g34]

Shooterready,

Thanks for the encouragement. I probably will slow down my load, but not until after the Gator Classic in October. I shot it last year and placed 13th, but this year my goal is to place top three. So I plan on spending all of my precious primers on all of my weak spots up until then.

CHA-LEE,

Thanks for the advice. The targets were not visible from one postion, but I know what you mean about engagement order.

[REmmons]

thanks G34

[g34]

This Sunday is a classifier match. The stages we are going to shoot look fairly easy with only one stage having strong and weak hand. Besides that they are pretty much speed shoots. Hopefully I can finally make B at this match before the Gator Classic.

[CSEMARTIN]

-

Edited August 1, 2009 by CSEMARTIN

[g34]

Yesterday marked one year since I shot my first USPSA match. I shot the Cajun Acion Shooters classifier match on the first sunday in August 2008 and 2009. It has been the most fun year of my life, and I have met a bunch of awesome people through USPSA.

This match was great. The classifiers were pretty fun without a lot of weak hand and long range shooting. My squad was awesome. Everyone helped out with pasting targets, setting steel, and ROing. I won 5 of 6 stages in production, and I think I finally made B class.

These are my classifier scores according to classifiercalc.com:

Fluffy's Revenge II: 37.2432( I wound up missing the last steel target four times before reloading and knocking it down.)

Steely Speed VII: 59.9992 (I looked up the 100% time for this stage before hand, and it is 3.5 seconds. That sounded kind of slow to me, but after missing one of the big steels three times, I have changed my assessment. )

Madness: 65.2736

High Standards: 66.5804 (Two observations on this stage. 1) always have you shirts tucked in very tightly around your magazines so you don't grab your shirt with the magazine. 2) My splits were about the same speed strong hand only as they were with two hands. I feel like it should be considerably slower, or my free style should be considerably faster, but I was just pulling the trigger when I saw the sights on target.)

On the Move: 75.0588

Six: 85.811

Results:

Place Name USPSA Class Division PF Lady Mil Law For Age Points Stg %

1 Fitzpatrick, Kevin A61677 C Production Minor N N N N 351.5823 100.00%

2 D., Curtis A53214 C Production Minor N N N N Senior 280.2604 79.71%

3 D., Brian FY52014 U Production Minor N N N N 227.5175 64.71%

4 S., Stephen A65578 U Production Minor N N N N 159.8040 45.45%

5 E., Hank A50176 C Production Minor N N N N 157.8723 44.90%

6 L., Robert Pen U Production Minor N N N N 98.1212 27.91%

7 B., Del Pen U Production Minor N N N N 92.6922 26.36%

Printed: 08/02/2009 12:28 PM

is the video.( sorry for the poor quality)

It also looks like I will be able to make the junior camp with the AMU this year, so I look forward to meeting some fellow junior shooters.

ETA: video

Edited August 3, 2009 by g34

[MemphisMechanic]

Your two highest current ones are a 65 and a 63... add in the best four from that match, and it puts you at 70.43% once they update the scores on the 15th... I think. The only wrench in that equation is that your most recent score is a 5% which has been discarded. I don't know if that is included in your "most recent 8" - bumping out one of your other goo,d recent scores with reagards to what the "most recent 8" are. So your score might actually be a little lower than that.

Did that make any sense at all?

On Speedy Steel 7, this is what a time just baaaaarely good enough for an A (75.15%) looks like. I had a horrendous grip on the draw, and tried to make it work. Consequently, I threw a hellacious mike to begin the stage. It wasn't even NEAR the popper...

Third stage - 0:55 into the video...

I shot it in 4.71 for a 6.36HF, which is 75.15%

Rick shot 3.75 for a 8.00HF, which is 94.39% (he's the GM with the G17 who shoots at the end of the video)

Oh, and please ignore the rest of the stages. I shot like crap, and couldn't remember when I supposed to reload to save my life. We so often get hammered with video from GM after GM on this forum, that I thought you'd like to see a non-super-shooter run through the same classifier that you did.

*muttering* freaking IDPA was never this complicated...

Honestly, I think you and I might be fairly closely matched on actual field courses. The primary thing holding you back is that you're young (with regards to the sport moreso than age) and you're trying to shoot good classifiers. I can see the tension on a couple of them just by watching the video, and comparing it to your body language in the rest of the match. Knock that crap off, and you'll do better immediately. Tension sucks.

[EDIT] A thought just occurred to me. It doesn't look like you usually miss steel during field courses. But it looks like you might be missing steel on classifiers much more often. It might be worth exploring the reasons for that. (hint: see above paragraph)

Edited August 4, 2009 by MemphisMechanic

[g34]

Thanks for the advice, and I do understand what you were saying about my current percentage.

I am definitely more tense while shooting classifiers. Mainly because I felt like I needed to make B. Now that I have made it, I am going to stop plugging in hit factors before I shoot the stage, and just shoot it like any other stage.

Thanks,

Kevin

[chbrow10]

I'd just like to say that I've had the good fortune of shooting on the same squad with Kevin a few times. In addition to being a great shooter, he is a great person. He is a polite, well spoken young man who is very helpful on the squad. If he isn't shooting, or getting ready to shoot, he is consistently pasting/resetting targets or running the clipboard.

Kevin, don't sweat the classification. It is just a letter. Shoot the classifiers like every other stage and don't worry. Max Michiel told us to "de-emphasize" the classifier at last year's AMU camp. I'm glad to hear that you are going to the camp this year.

Hope to see you on the range,

Chris

[g34]

Mr. Chris,

I just saw this post. Thanks for the kind words, it is also a pleasure shooting with you and Haydn.

I'm gonna try and make it to Stennis sometime soon, so I will probably see you there in a couple months.

-Kevin

[g34]

I shot a USPSA match today after a 1 month break. One thing that I am finding, is that I seem to be able to shoot just as well at a match whether it is a one month break, or a one weak break as long as I keep up with my dry firing. We had a lot of shooters at todays match, and 14 production shooters. I had a good time, and got to meet Jerry Miculek. You wouldn't think that the guy who is working hard, and sticking around after the match to tear down is one of the best shooters in the world. He seems like a really great guy. We shot 5 stages from the open/production nationals. I had too many extra shots, and had one no shoot(I also got the alpha). Besides this, all of my reloads were clean, and I had good hits.

Place Name USPSA Class Division PF Lady Mil Law For Age Points Stg %

1 Fitzpatrick, Kevin A61677 B Production Minor N N N N Junior 360.5319 100.00%

2 T., Jeffery TY53721 B Production Minor N N N N 314.8237 87.32%

3 W., Kevin A55097 C Production Minor N N N N 267.0932 74.08%

Here is the video

As usual, I appreciate all advice on my shooting.

Thanks,

Kevin

[MemphisMechanic]

This is something I wish I was better at doing myself:

On the stage with the turtle targets (at 0:45) watch your exit from the right position, where you double-back to finish on the left. See how you do a small drop-step with your right foot to push off to the left? You kept that foot in bounds, because that's what we always do. Once your done shooting, remember that it's okay to step past the fault like with that sucker in order to push off to the left more aggressively.

It doesn't look like it would have made a difference in this situation, but I say this mostly to keep it in mind for a future position where you have to shoot nearly falling over to make a shot around the end of the barricade - where your weight is biased completely in the wrong direction: Finish shooting, and immediately step well out of bounds to plant your drive leg where it can instantly help you accelerate, rather than having to lean/fall in the direction you want to go, and then push off.

Make sense?

Edited September 13, 2009 by MemphisMechanic