Lee King

[Lee King]

I just started keeping a diary on another blog. Enos is such a better resource for this though. I'm going to copy and paste the couple of entries I had there to this post so it may be a bit long.

5/6/2008

I went to Mike Seeklander's site http://www.shooting-performance.com and filled out the training plan form. I got it today. WOW! I'm blown away. He went so far as to pull my classifiers and address specific weaknesses. Anyone reading this should really check out the sight. It's an excellent resource and will only get better with interest. I'm trying to format my diary entries per his plan.

DRY FIRE SESSION - 10:00-10:30pm

Dry fired focusing on fundamentals. Sight picture. Transition. Draw. Reload.

Drills: Drill #1 from the Anderson book. Draw and sight picture. Also performed the 2-2-2 drill on targets evenly spaced (couldn't tell you the number). Modified it to 2-2-2 reload 2-2-2.

For some reason I had a difficult time finding the sights on basic draw drills. I'd draw and have to "wiggle" the gun to lock onto them. After a few minutes I started to settle back down. I still don't trust my grip on my gun (just bought it in Feb/March) or the holster. Need more reps to get a comfort level.

Moved to transitions. 3 targets evenly spaced. Again, I had a hard time getting focused on the front sight. I slowed down and forced myself to get a good picture on each. Eventually I was back up to speed.

RESULTS:

I don't have a timer yet so results are very subjective. I felt that by the end of the session I was picking up the sights "at speed". I struggled with the appropriate focus (snap to target, snap to sights, verify target), though I could see improvement by the end of the session.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE (scale of 1-10):

Started as a 3 when struggling to find sights. Ended with a 6. My confidence is growing with use of new equipment.

OPPORTUNITIES:

Drill sight focus. Repeat the 2-2-2 drill slowly with emphasis on sight picture during the firing cycle.

[Lee King]

Copy and Paste entries from other diary:

Quick evaluation of skills...

Accuracy - better than average. I shot a stink bug on a target at 15 yards... will do.

Mental - Break down into components

a) Focus - better than average. I am able to focus on each shot and let bad shots go. Still working on a clear mind while shooting.

Planning - average, maybe less than average. I am learning the nuances of breaking down a stage. For example, took too long shots on stage 2 at State. Had to run up to targets anyway. Should've held 2 of them until I was in last position.

Movement - almost no skills - I try to explode from position to position rather than take targets on the move. I also need to work on subtle skills like staying down after entering a box. Having the gun on target ready to fire as soon as I hit my spot.

Transition - average. Working on snapping my eyes to target. Need work on "subtle" skills.

Draw - average. Don't trust my holster yet.

Trigger control - below average - I have great control while dry firing and slow fire. But add the stress of competing and I pin the trigger like I'm trying to break it. Need to work on relaxing.

----------------------------------------------------------

Range report Sat 4/26

Worked on movement. I set up 3 targets down range and one to the side. Two positions. A start position and an end position. The drill was to shoot the "start" target, then transition to the other 3 shooting while moving from position a to b.

Observations:

Front sight front sight front sight. Have the patience to aquire it... then time per footfall. I was fairly successful at getting hits. A hits were elusive. I could always get both hits though.

Interestingly enough, I got the most A hits on target 1. It's as if 2 and 3 got progressively sloppier. I think a lot has to do with trigger control. I got more and more tense with each step.

Without a timer or baseline it's hard to know how fast I was. But frankly, I'm more into baby steps than time with this one.

Opportunities:

Trigger control. I gripped the gun with my trigger hand like I was trying to strangle it. I feel certain it was causing me to pull every shot low and left. When I slow down and relax, I'm dead on. I need to work on trigger control under stress.

Next step:

Static transition drills. Maybe el pres and variations. Focus on trigger control and speed. Try to find a timer so I can add time stress.

5/1/2008 LOCAL MATCH PREP

Gah been slacking... haven't even dry fired this week. Tonight the plan is to dry fire focusing on trigger control and sight picture.

Tommorrow I will measure success as follows:

Consistent trigger pull

Front sight focus

Some movement

I am excited to see how I shoot the texas star. I haven't shot one since I first got the gun (sights way off).

5/2/2008 DRY FIRE

Preparing for local match tommorrow. Dry fired with focus on front sight. Tried to see the red glow (very dim with the one lamp in the room). If I could see the red, I was lasered on the sight. Worked on snapping my eye from target to target.

Need to practice changing focus, snap to new target, move gun to target, snap to front sight, laser focus. Feels awkward to shift focus.

Keys for match are to see the sights, relax trigger finger. Shoot only as fast as I can see.

5/3/2008 LOCAL MATCH - PALMETTO GUN CLUB

Shot well today. Ran the match clean.

Stage 1, 6 paper and 3 steel.. mags on table, unloaded gun, mandatory reloads between arrays. Little off on the steel. Good focus on front sight. Will have to look at final results for finish. Seems that I finished high with a decent run. I think trigger control caused my struggles with the steel.

Stage 2, classifier, two something. cm99-10(?) Again, good front sight focus. Little trepidatious entering 2nd box after my 2 falls last night. Ran it in 8.xx Front sight focus a little more fuzzy. NO transitions. Finished top 5.

Stage 3, stairs. Good front sight focus. Need to continue to work transitions. Got to shoot on the move. It took me a couple of steps to aquire the front sight on the first moving target. I over ran the targets and had to stop to hit the last two before climbing the stairs. Have no clue what the hell happened on the steel. Took WAY too many shots. Trigger control. Front sight focus was good. I think I was yanking trigger.

Stage 4, the bus. Struggled with steel. Again, good front sight focus, trigger control and transitions hurt.

Stage 5, good focus, good trigger control. Not so good with transitions. Shoot on the move on only a couple of targets did well on those. Cleareed plates and star quickly. 2nd plate took a little bit of effort but I finished strong. I took 3rd on this one. It felt weird because I thought I had a pretty average at best run. My plan was WAY off on this one. Jack's way was much better. Mine required too much wasted movement. Note - if you can see targets from multiple positions, take them from the last possible position if you can save movement. Original plan called for clearing targets on the move in the right port backing out, moving to left port bypassing steel, then coming back to middle wall to shoot star from under. You could see all but 1 of the targets in the back from under the wall. Shooting from there saved movement to each port. I hit the 1 target you couldn't see when the angle was right WHILE moving to the wall. Jack's plan saved me on this one.

Positives - good sight focus. Better with trigger control. Ran clean. Movement helped a lot. Wish I had video of first 1/2 of stage 3.

Bad - trigger control. Need to force myself to work steel. Transistions - NONE, ZERO, NADA. Didn't snap my eyes at all. Speed. Still don't trust the sight picture. Getting better. But I need to work on splits.

Bizarre - got hit in the tongue with shrapnel from plate... the TONGUE?! WTF?

[Lee King]

MATCH TOMORROW LOCAL - MID CAROLINA RIFLE CLUB

I should've dry fired last night. I was so tired I slacked. That's what I get for doing kumite back to back at karate.

GOALS

Consistent front sight focus

Proper Target Transistion

Trigger control - good trigger prep - don't choke the trigger

SUCCESS

Front sight focus - Success will be measured by mikes. I ran the last local match clean.

Target transitions - I will feel good if I notice ANY proper transitions. At this point awareness under stress will be a good step.

Trigger control - mikes will be important here as well. Awareness is key here as well. If I can notice the trigger feel under stress I will feel I have made a stride towards awareness and correction.

[Nemo]

Note to Lee King: GET NEW HOLSTER.

Glad to see you here my friend!

[Lee King]

Note to Lee King: GET NEW HOLSTER.

Glad to see you here my friend!

HAHA!!

I bought a Ghost and am giving it a shot. I've jumped up and down, did the twist, snapped my hips as hard as I could trying to get the gun to come out and couldn't get it to. My daughter thought the whole exercise was hilarious!

Thanks for stopping by!

[Lee King]

"LOCAL" MATCH - MID-CAROLINA RIFLE CLUB 5/10/2008

RESULTS - Top C 6 of 13. 13 of 41 overall.

Had an ok day. Was impressed by my consistency until I realized the "other" Lee had the spot I thought I did on stage 2. I was about 1/2 down on that one. Quick recap

Stage 1: Ran it well. Again Jack's plan made the difference. Mirror image stage. Right and left side 3 targets and 2 poppers. Middle had 4 targets with a lot of no shoots. Only had clear shot on 2 from each extreme side. My plan was to start left, take 3 and the 2 plates. Step 2 to the right and shoot the far target and close target. Move to other side of middle port while reloading, hit the other 2 visible, Step 2 right and clear right side. Jack's plan was almost the same except after first stop in the middle, move ALL the way right, shoot that side then 2 steps back to the left to shoot last 2 middle targets. Not sure if it was faster, but if felt smoother. I think stopping on the way would've cost at least a second or two.

Stage 2: Starting at table, clear 4 in front of you, 4 on the left on the move. 2 on either side of a wall. Star through a port.

I actually thought I ran this one well aside from the 1 sec foul up on reload. Sights snapped back on the first 4 and I felt like I could push the speed and did. Hit the left side on the move and actually overran my reload. Threw off my round count because I shot the 1st target by the wall on the left before the reload. My plan was to hit it after the reload. Changed mags, engaged target on right and "click". Fast reload and I moved on. I did struggle with the star. 24.xx seconds. 2nd fastest in our squad. Turned out to be horribly slow overall. Reload and star killed me.

Stage 3: First stage of the day. Ran ok. 4 targets on the left. 4 through a wall on the right. 1 hidden target on left right before the door. Open a door, 2 steel, drop turner, swinger and static.

Turn and draw. Plan was to shoot the 4 on the left while moving to the port on the right. Couldn't get my sights to settle enough to get moving. Took 3 statically and finally felt comfortable to take a step on the last target (farthest). Hit 2 on the move coming into the port. Hit the hidden target on the way to the door. Struggled with steel (close, shouldn't have been that hard). Finished strong with good hits on drop turner and swinger.

Stage 4: 3 ports with doors. 3 targets at each port. right and left were close. Middle was mid-range.

Melt-down. Opened first port. Started shooting strong hand because I had the door in my hand. Didn't see the sights on 2nd target took an extra shot (4 yards at best). Settled down for middle port taking all three smoothly. Went into last port with time on the brain (big mistake), Went into overdrive strong hand again. Needed extra shot on 2nd target again. 3rd target "bang-click". Fumbled reload. Finally got mag seated for 1 shot. 16.xx seconds. Bottom of the pack.

Stage 5. Classifier Steeler Standards.

Felt like an average at best run. 3 strings. 1st 1 shot freestyle, reload, 1 shot freestyle. Felt good. Strong reload. Decent time. 2nd, 1 shot freestyle, reload, 1 shot strong only. Took a mike on 3rd target. Good sight picture. Good trigger control. Sight dipped right as I broke the shot. Didn't yank it. Just didn't settle the sights enough. 3rd string 1 shot weak hand only.

Turned out it was my best stage. According to classifier calc I scored 57.x%. The mike would've put me above 60%.

Based on my goals my trigger control was much better. Focus was good. I still can't "say" I was doing proper target transitions.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE (1-10): 7 I ran strong on most stages. I understand my meltdown on 4.

OPPORTUNITIES

Continue shoot on the move drills

Drill transitions, proper focus through firing cycle

Study study study upcoming Miss. Classic stages. Try to identify potential weaknesses.

Drill reloads.

Work on close target drills. MUST RESPECT THE TARGET NO MATTER WHAT THE DISTANCE. I HAVE TO SEE THE SIGHTS!

Oh and we won't discuss mean drunks!

Edited May 12, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE 5/14/2008 - PREP FOR MISSISSIPPI CLASSIC

"I feel like JACK-SON MISS-ISSIPI!!" - Kid Rock

I had every intention of dry firing every night. But then packing got in the way damnit! Finally had time to dry fire last night. I was worried about having to "find" my sight like I did last week. No problems. Gun snapped into place with sight in the A-zone every time.

GOALS:

Front sight focus.

Draw - equipment practice

Transitions - correct eye movement and focus

Close targets - force myself to quit "point shooting" and see a sight picture.

RESULTS:

Front sight focus: I was surprised at how well my front sight was snapping into the A zone. I struggled last week finding the sights.

Draw: My mail focus with Draw drills was to continue to build both confidence in my new holster and to break the shot as I extend. I have a bad tendency to draw, pause, fire. I want to have the sight picture ready the second I extend. Good practice. Need lots of reps in future.

Transitions: Still working on it. I would say I was 50/50 noticing the transition. I need to shoot some video to see whether or not I'm doing it subconsciously when I'm "at speed". Slowed down on 2-2-2 drills to concentrate on target, front sight, verify, snap. Next target, move gun, front sight, verify, snap etc. 10 reps. Feels more natural each time.

Close targets: My worst stage this past weekend was one where targets were just beyond arms length. I really blazed through them and while I got all my hits, I had to make up 2 which hosed me in the end (had to reload for 1). I wanted to experiment with sight picture on targets up close. Move to within feet of the wall to do the 2-2-2 drill. I continuously caught myself not being able to call the shots. Slowed down and worked on a "snap" picture. Eventually I was back up to speed with a sight picture. Not a drill I want to do a lot. Definitely a "gear change" skill.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE:

Good solid 8 on sight picture. I took only 1 mike last weekend and I had good focus during dry fire. The gun snapped to a good sight picture every time.

Draw: 5. Trusting the holster more and more. Building confidence to snap the shot at extend.

Transition: 5. Would like to a) know I do it consciously every time or see other evidence I'm doing it "under stress" to move this number up.

Close target: 5. 1 dry fire session isn't going to boost this one.

GOALS FOR MATCH:

1) Consistent performance. I want to run each stage the same way. On the edge of too fast. But in control. I managed that on 4 of 5 stages over the weekend but lost it on stage 4 (worst stage). While I didn't do well on stage 2 I felt strong.

2) Front sight focus: Call EVERY shot.

3) Transition: Would like to at least notice proper focus once. Goal was 50% last match, never noticed 1. Awareness is the key to improvement.

4) Mental: Stay focused on every stage. Respect ALL targets. I need to avoid the "I can burn this one down" attitude. My performance will be what it will be.

[Lee King]

MISSISSIPPI CLASSIC - 5/17 - 5/18/2008

Results: 3RD PLACE C (out of 22)!! WOOT! First time placing.

SUMMARY:

We started on 10 so I'll go in that order.

Stage 10: popper 2 paper on left. 1 paper on far right. Through a gap in walls 2 on left. 3 poppers on right between barrels. Pass another wall 2 paper and 4 steel plates. Move to left 2 paper, 2 poppers activating non-disappear clamshells.

Strong first stage. 26th. Timer was set to par time so I hit the steel and 2 paper and heard "BEEP". Reshoot. Only hiccup was I didn't see the sight on the far right target. I started to transition away into the door and thought I had a miss. Swung the gun back and saw the 2nd hole so there was a second wasted. Other than that I felt relaxed. Took 1 extra shot on first set of poppers and settled down to go 1 for 1 on rest.

Stage 1: 4 targets stacked with hard cover in the middle covering partial C zones. Move up 4 targets with barrels obscuring. Move up to port, targets with 2 poppers 1 of which activated swinger, move left 2 poppers, swinger, and 2 paper. 1 popper was in front of no shoot.

I ran ok until the end. The swinger killed me. The right popper was placed so that when I hit it, the swinger should be right above it. I hit it, then the swinger. It was lifting and I couldn't call the shot so I moved on to the other statics. Timing got off and had to wait forever for the paper to reappear. I think I had a jam too. Placed 43 of 69 on this one. Too slow.

Stage 2: Moving left to right. Mostly static. Drop out target in the middle. drop turner and strong hand reach around target at end.

HORRIBLE! Had serious magazine troubles. Wasted probably 7 seconds if not more trying to clear the problem. Once I got the mag worked out I felt good and strong. Tried to take the popper at the end (activator for the drop turner on the move). Took 3 shots to hit it. Finished 60 of 69. Cost me 1st C.

Stage 3: Start behind a table. 3 open targets on the right. 2 through port on left. 3 after port on left. 2 on the right. Popper activating a swinger and 4 statics at the end.

Again.. HORRIBLE.. Started strong. Hit the first 3.. moved to the port. Good stance. Planted on my spot. bang bang and magazine fell out. Reload.. lost track of round count. Ran dry at the end. 47th of 69. Had an idea as to which magazine might be causing the problems.

Stage 4: 8 paper and 5 steel. All in line. Barrels obscuring. Start with handgun unloaded on table.

Had another jam. This one just took a rack to clear. Jam cost me a second or 2. 39 out of 69. Marked offending mag and used it for barney only. All probs went away.

Stage 5: Classifier - On the Move

Best stage of the day. Decided to quit thinking about winning and just shoot for fun. Good plan. good sight focus. Good trigger control = great run. 20 of 69.

Stage 6: Start behind a wall. Barrels down the middle. Targets down left and right sides. No shoots and barrels partially obscured. 2 poppers and 2 static through port at end.

Stepped around wall using stance to take everything on the right, moved left taking that side on the move. I thought I ran strong on that one. In fact, it felt like my best stage. Ended up being just so so. 34 of 69.

Stage 7. 2 paper and 4 poppers in the middle. 4 on the right. 4 on the left. Side to side movement.

This one was deceiving because the shooting box wasn't parallel to targets so left side was farther than right. Again, relaxed and just focused on shooting. Sight focus. Trigger control. 2nd best stage of day. 21 out of 69.

Stage 8. Shot this one Sunday morning. Had to open a door. 3 ports with flaps you hand to push open. Only a few targets "in the open".

I was freaked out about this one. We heard the unfortunate story about a certain prominent junior who was DQ'd for sweeping herself opening the right port. I went into this one thinking "don't @#$* up". Tried to run very conservatively. Honestly, I don't remember how I ran this one, only that I went into each port with my gun OBVIOUSLY out of the way of my hand. Pro photographer had a shot of me running with my "gat" because I held it so high away from my other hand. Good finish 25th.

Stage 9: Last stage. A lot like 7. Star in the middle. 3 on the left. 3 on the right. Goal was just to finish without a major disaster. Went 1 for 1 on the star. Took 1 extra on the right. Was a good make up, it would've been a mike. 22nd.

POSITIVES:

Ran clean.

Finished strong in spite of early problems.

Good sight focus.

Strong steel. Was able to change gears appropriately.

NEGATIVES:

Magazine. I identified the offender and it's my barney now.

Mental. Once I quit worrying about winning I suddenly shot so much better.

OBSERVATIONS:

It's all about the shot. It doesn't matter what went wrong on what stage. Or right for that matter. It's about seeing the sight, squeezing the trigger, and moving. That simple. I have to learn to take each shot, step, stage on it's own merit and focus on tasks required to complete and forget about everything else. It's funny how I had "given up" on winning anything. I didn't give up on shooting. I just changed my focus to getting through the stage without screwing up and with strong fundamentals and I suddenly got more consistent and ran strong. It is a good reminder, relaxed is smooth, smooth is fast.

OPPORTUNITIES:

All around practice. The more I shoot the more I trust the sight picture, trigger squeeze etc. Technically, I need to improve my splits and focus on economy of motion.

Edited May 20, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE - 5/22/2008 5:40pm

Went through the usual drills. My fiber came loose in Mississippi. Like an idiot, I didn't have any replacements. Jack didn't have red but he had green and let me use a piece. WOW what a difference the green makes. I thought the red was bright but... WOW.

When dry firing, I noticed how easy it is with the green to do proper transistions. Even when I wasn't focusing on eye movement, I realized I was doing it subconsciously. I snapped my eyes to target, then that blazing green sight draws my eye automatically to the front sight as I'm driving the gun into my line of sight. Once I realized this, I focused on speed.

Drills:

Draw - worked on breaking the shot at extend. I also noticed in pictures I bring the gun WAY up before I start to move it in front of my body to meet my support hand. I focused on minimizing the move to clear the holster and go to support hand sooner in the draw.

Transistion - see above

Speed - 2-2-2 drills - focused on A zone sight pics. Pushed the speed. I really need to buy a timer.

Turn and draw - This was an interesting drill because I have started to see correlations to the way we do things in karate and shooting applications. I worked on foot placement and economy of motion. I'm not sure if I'm doing it the fastest way. But I went from right foot moves to behind left foot about shoulder width. Turn and draw. Move up with left foot into stance. In karate we start the same, but the turn is a simple hip snap. The feet just rotate in place. Because you place your right foot behind your left, when you snap the hips you are already in stance. I modified this to a much shorter step to start so that when I snap the hips, my feet are almost parallel. It kind of reminds me of marching band and ROTC "about faces". Except with much more aggression in the hips. I found that if I move my hand to the gun as my right foot is moving, I can draw and drive the gun as I'm snapping around. I used to wait for my left foot to move up to parallel before breaking the shot. Now I feel like I can break it as soon as the sights hit the target. It almost feels faster than my regular draw because I feel more comfortable snapping the shot at extend. Why am I more comfortable doing this in a turn draw than relaxed draw

Another note on the turn and draw, Jack showed me the trick of looking at your gun from surrender. It is contradictory to say.. the Burkett videos where you try to cheat your eyes toward the target. But I feel stronger with the draw that way. My head is snapping around long before my body even when I start looking down at the gun. It will be interesting to try some live fire and time it.

Table draws - worked a few loaded gun on table drills.

Reloads - 2-2-2 reload 2-2-2. Started off feeling sloppy on this one. If I nailed the reload I wouldn't see the sights on the first target after. Slowed down a bit and focused on fast reloads, but good sight pictures no matter how long. I am learning to NEVER sacrifice the sight picture. A sub-second reload is no good if you throw a mike immediately after.

RESULTS:

Seeing that blazing green sight even in low light was a real confidence builder. I know I'm doing transitions. They are just not "conscious". I'm going to continue to drill myself on eye movement. But it's nice to know it's starting to take. I felt like I had some break throughs on my turn and draw as well as front sight focus. As they always say, you can only shoot as fast as you can see. Good repetitions are hopefully locking that movement in and allowing me to go faster and faster.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 7 all around. I've made strides with trusting the equipment. My draws feel better.

Edited May 23, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE 5/26/2008

SUMMARY:

Out of town for holiday weekend. Dry fired briefly when I got back. I picked up a 22/45 to use for steel challenge and spent about 10 minutes dry firing it. I'm noticing a serious tendency to draw to the left. I.e., when I snap a sight picture with this gun, the front sight is way off to the left. I'm planning a live fire session tomorrow with both the 22/45 and my limited gun. Though after the session I'm wondering if using the 22/45 will hinder any progress I'm making with my limited gun.

I have also decided to ramp up my physical training. Even though my weight is holding steady at around 192-195ish.. I saw the pictures of myself from the Miss. Classic and I look HUGE. I also feel like my tire is growing. I have to wonder what 10 lbs would do to my ability to move and "explode" to and from positions. I try to take karate at least 2 nights a week (I usually make 2). My plan was to alternate live fire practice on Wed. nights and the upper belt spar class. So far in the last month I think I went to the Wed class once and have yet to live fire. I'm going to add running during lunch on mon. and wed. I'm going to add a report of my physical training to the diary as well (just as a note, not separate entries)

GOAL:

Just to do SOME kind of dry fire

DRILLS:

Quick 2-2-2 - Focused on sight picture. How the 22/45 felt with regards to trigger, grip, weight.

RESULTS:

Little shaky. Pushing the sights to the left a lot. I also need to order a fiber front. It's night and day when compared to my limited gun. Can't imagine a gun without fiber on the front now.

PHYSICAL:

Had every intention of attending karate Thurs night. Showed up at 7ish and realized there was a seminar at 6:30 (no classes). I really wanted to go to the seminar too. MUST USE CALENDAR ON CRACKBERRY FOR THESE THINGS

Quick run (30 min) 5/26.

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE 5/28/08

Prep for live fire practice.

DRILLS:

Used 1/3 size target on hall door. Snapped on the move down the hall forward and backward.

Draw

2-2-2

Turn and draw

Turn and 2-2-2

RESULTS:

I was able to push the speed on the movement drills quite a bit. I struggled moving backwards though. I spent way too much time thinking about the movement and not so much the sight picture in reverse.

Draw - Focused on economy of motion. Trying to break the habit of drawing really high before moving to the support hand. I need to video myself.

2-2-2 - I felt like I was transitioning more than not. I have to remember to practice transitions both left to right and right to left. I caught myself doing it only in 1 direction. I had to force myself to go the other way and it was really awkward focus wise.

Turn and Draw - Again, focusing on economy of motion. Was actually giving up the sights because I was so focused on my feet etc. NEVER EVER GIVE UP THE SIGHT PICTURE. Slowed down and forced myself to see the sights.

Turn and 2-2-2. Stronger once I stopped thinking about my feet.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 6 Struggling with the turn and draws. Felt like I took a step back with those.

PHYSICAL:

Karate class last night. Felt good. Need to work more on cardio, but I noticed a difference after just 1 day of running. Tomorrow will be the real test.

[Lee King]

LIVE FIRE 5/28/2008

GOALS:

Try out and sight in 22/45

Trigger control and sight focus

Shooting on the move

DRILLS and RESULTS:

I used the drills in my training plan from Mike Seeklander (can't say enough about his site and plan.. gotta plug it http://www.shooting-performance.com/index.html it's free.. he has vids too.. awesome). His drills called for 3 targets set from 4-13 yards. I opted for steel plates instead. I tried to stagger them but the damned ground was so hard I couldn't get the stands to drive in anywhere other than the berm

I started each drill with visualization followed by dry fire, finally live fired the drill.

Drill: 2-2-2 reload 2-2-2.

Was shocked the first time my limited gun when BOOM after shooting the 22/45. Had to chuckle. Hit the plate though. I ran this drill strong. Still need to get a damned timer!

Drill: 2-2-2 strong hand reload 2-2-2 weak hand

Seriously struggled with this one. Good sight picture strong hand. Missed all over the place. Must be trigger control. Weak hand is a disaster. Sight picture... trigger control... clearly need more work on this. I think I may step back and just try some simple marksmanship exercises strong and weak hand.

Drill: 2 barrels about 3 feet apart side by side. 3 plates in line. Move in figure 8 firing 2-2-2. When mag is empty, reload, keep shooting and moving. Run til mags are empty.

Holy crap what a hard drill. I was getting my hits but I was moving SA-LOWW! I guess this is a good drill to work on multitasking a- sight picture (always sight picture) b- trigger control c- movement d- knowing in your periphery where the damned barrels are!. I went through 3 mags and decided to move on. This one is a good one to do, but I still need to focus on fundamentals.

Drill: two boxes.. first lined up with left target 2nd lined up with right. Start 5 yards out of left box. Enter box 2l - 2c run to right 2r - 2c run to left repeat until empty.

My focus on trigger control started to slip here a bit. I wanted to try to start moving as I was breaking the 2nd shot. But I found I was missing the plates way too much on the 1st shot (moving my eyes to the next target too soon). It held me in place to hear the ring of the plate before I moved to the next box. I had my gun up coming into the box, but I struggled to settle the sights to snap the shot causing a pause. I'm torn on this one... if I switch to paper I can focus more on the movement.. but am I giving up the good hit for the sake of movement? The firing cycle is everything. Perhaps just trying it slower...

Final drill: ring the plates steel challenge style.

Running low on ammo at this point and was annoyed at my slipping trigger control. As Mike S. says, stop when you start to lose focus. Only problem is, during a match you can't just stop even if your focus slips. I see this as an opportunity to drill my "focus" and mental game. I went back to fundamentals and focused on the firing cycle. Strong finish. 1 full mag. Only 1 extra shot.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 6

Hate that I was losing focus on trigger control. I had good sight pictures, but I had a lot of mikes on the movement drills to the point where I stopped focusing on the movement to get back to good hits. I think I just need patience and keep working the drills. Speed and efficiency will come as long as I NEVER give up fundamentals.

Also I think I need to get a different trigger. Mine is curved. I thought I would like it because it was more like my kimber. But I get one hell of a blister on my trigger finger where it rubs against the frame. I think if I switch to a straight trigger the extra length will get my finger away from the frame.

PHYSICAL TRAINING:

Ran at lunch. Knew the cardio crash would come after a strong run monday and decent workout at karate Tues. Did not feel strong.

Edited May 29, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

LIVE FIRE 6/1/2008 5:30pm

GOALS:

No real goal in mind. An opportunity to run to the range presented itself. I didn't really pre-plan the session like I should. My impromptu goals were to work movement drills. I only had about 200 rounds with me. I geared the session to the 200 round limit.

DRILLS:

3 steel plates in line on berm. I set a 4th plate to the side to use as a "start" plate.

Drill 1: Figure 8 around 2 barrels per Mike Seeklander's training plan.

I actually did this one better than I did Wed afternoon. I probably should've warmed up with something easier but with limited rounds I decided to jump into the deep end. I would say I was about 85% ringing the plates. I felt much more confident with the movement. Only ran 2 mags on this one though.

Drill 2: Draw and fire on "start plate" the move on angle engaging each plate twice. Hit "stop point" and engage plates backing up.

This one surprised me. I was probably 90% on the plates on this one the first couple of runs. I decided to push the movement speed some and accuracy dropped off a little... but not much. If these were paper I'd still get my hits. I noticed I was starting to separate the movement from the firing cycle. I think this is the key to doing this one faster. Getting to a point where I'm focusing 100% on sight/trigger control instead of moving my feet.

Drill 2a: Same thing starting on left side of bay. No plate for "start". Draw and engage plates moving on angle.

Ran this one REALLY well. I was just showing another shooter how to do the drill and surprised myself with 100% hits.

Drill 3: Side to side. Engage each plate with 2 rounds moving left to right, then reverse.

I struggled at the extreme ends of this drill. It was very awkward to keep my shoulders squared to the targets as my body moved and the angles changed. I was almost having to consciously "switch sides" as the targets moved from "ahead" of my movement to "behind". I was shooting the plates fast enough that I had to cycle through them multiple times to get practice on the full range of motion. I.e. when moving left to right I shot each plate 6 times. Lot of misses at the end when I felt I had to contort my body the most to shoot "back" at the plates.

Drill 4: Movement into a location. Start "box" draw and engage start plate. Back around barrel, move forward to 2nd position and engage 3 plates 2x each.

I wanted to focus on getting my feet moving after the first couple of shots instead of waiting for the hits. I see a lot of stages where you engage several targets from a start position. I feel like I get my feet stuck until after the last shot is fired on the last "start" target. I also wanted to focus on getting my gun up and firing sooner on entering the 2nd position. I catch myself having to pause to settle the sights when entering a position. This was probably the sloppiest drill. Lot of misses on this one. I was spending too much time focusing on getting my feet moving instead of fundamentals. I really pushed the speed once I was in the 2nd position to kind of combine drills. Felt awkward both leaving and entering each position.

Ultimately, I slowed down and dry fired each movement breaking it down into sequences. Backing out of 1st position. Entering 2nd position. I don't want to get into the habit of "giving up the sight picture" just for the sake of movement.

Drill 5: Draw

Worked on snapping shot at arm extension. Horrible. I think I may have hit the plate 1 time. I only had about 10 rounds left when I did this one. So 1 for 10... pretty crappy. I need to work on tying the firing cycle into extension. I'm pretty sure I was jerking the trigger instead of squeezing.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 6

I felt more solid on movement. But I felt like I sacrificed fundamentals at times.

PHYSICAL TRAINING:

Had every intention of going to karate Thurs but got sidelined with a headache... a bad one.. enough to make me nauseous. Made up for it with a run after work Fri. Actually had a strong run. Made it the full 3 miles strong.

Edited June 2, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE 6/3/2008 9:30pm

Just spent a few minutes doing casual dry fire during commercials.

GOAL:

Strong hand weak hand. I seriously struggled with this Sun during live fire. Was about 50% with strong hand and less with weak. I need to work on this skill as there is at least 1 stage at Summer Blast requiring both strong and weak hand shots.

DRILL:

Nothing fancy. Using each hand sight on objects on fireplace mantel.

RESULTS:

I have performed variations on strong hand/weak hand during dry fire before and always feel good about it. That is until the first real shot is fired and I can't hit s@#$!. Same was true Sun. Good sight picture. I felt like I had good trigger control but the shots were all over the place. Again, during dry fire I have strong sight picture (not wavering at all). Perhaps it's my grip. All I can do is keep practicing. Focus on fundamentals. Good squeeze. Trigger finger isolation. I did play with finger placement on the grip weak hand. I don't have a huge mag release. It is oversize but it's not so big it gets activated on table draws. However, I did feel it in my hand at a recent match and it distracted me for fear of activating it while shooting. If I spread my fingers slightly it falls between my index and middle finger and I still feel like I have a strong grip.

Need more live fire strong and weak hand. Perhaps next live fire session. I wonder if the weight of a full mag changes things too.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 8. I always feel good about this dry firing. I even feel good when the shot breaks for real. It's the WTF? when the shot misses that I'm struggling with.

PHYSICAL TRAINING:

Ran yesterday at lunch. Went to karate last night. Stomach is sore as hell today. The women kept giggling during drills involving a little contact. So the Sensei set us up to trade roundhouse kicks to the stomach. I lost count around 70. I think we did 100. He kept going until he was satisfied we were finally making serious contact (no more giggling).

[Lee King]

LOCAL MATCH - PALMETTO GUN CLUB

This match had a few firsts for me. The regular match director was out of town shooting 3gun. He asked me to run the match this month. So 1st time as MD. My worst stages were short stages for once. My field skills seem to be improving. 1st C overall (1st time for overall). I actually beat an open shooter for whom I have a great deal of respect. He and I were neck in neck in L10. But beating him as an open shooter was a 1st.

4th overall out of 21. 2nd limited (of 4.. 1st being GM)

I'll start in the order we shot.

STAGES:

Stage 4 - Gauntlet II. 2 poppers hidden on either side all the way at the end. Several close targets down the middle. Last 3 over hard cover. Surrender turn and draw. 26 rounds.

I had a screw up at the beginning. I chose to turn and draw the "wrong" way because you could run to the right, hit the popper, hit 2 "inside the hall" on the way across to the left side. Hit the single coming back to the middle to start down the "hall". I felt the 2 would hold you up more than the single. I thought it would be smoother to transition into the hall with only 1 target coming around the corner instead of 2. 2 seconds off of the GM time. HUGE mistake going to the left side. Planted my foot short and when I leaned I couldn't see the popper. Had to scoot... scoot... then I could see it. Probably cost me the 2 seconds. Hit everything on the move. Smooth. It felt strong. 3rd overall

Stage 5 - Almost identical copy of one of my worst stages from Miss. Classic. Lot of targets on right in "bays". 90 degree dogleg to the left at the end with port in the turn. Popper in 2nd to last port activating swinger at last position. 32 rounds

Strong run. I got stuck in the port at the 90 degree turn. During walk-throughs, my plan was to stay out of the port and take smooth sidesteps "slicing" the pie. I should almost be at the last position to take an extreme right hand target through port. I.e. keep moving to the last position while engaging through the port. 2 things went wrong with this. 1st, I kept moving taking the targets right before the port (not bad.. just wasn't planning that) 2nd, I took an extra step making my reload putting me almost in the port and too far to the right. I ended up shuffling for each target instead of the smooth pie slice I had planned. It probably cost me 3-4 extra seconds. Still took 3rd overall on this one.

Stage 1 - Wall. 3 targets on left, 1 paper and 4 plates on right. 2 targets on left partially obsucred with no shoot. 12 rounds

I took 2 extra shots on plates. Other than that, a decent run. Static position. No reload. 5th overall.

Stage 2 - Classifier 99-48 3 targets. 2 targets had 1 c zone obscured with no shoot. 1 had both c zones painted hard cover.

Virginia Count. 2-2-2 reload 2-2-2. 12 rounds.

Ugh... worst stage of the day. Usually I kick ass on the classifier and suck on everything else. This time I switched it. The really tricky part was the hard cover target at 36 ft. On the first pass I slowed down. On the 2nd not so much. I was only .17 sec. off of the GM time.. not that it mattered. I pulled 2 into hard cover. Both were just inside the tape used to paint it. So I was probably only 1" to the left. But 2 mikes. 9th overall.

Stage 3 - 8 targets in a line. Walls and barrels obscured the targets so from the left side of barrels, you had to lean and shoot across to the right and vice-versa. 16 rounds.

I tried to explode from the start box. Not sure how successful I was. I focused more on the blister developing on my finger than anything else. Strong run though. Came into the 2nd position firing as I was leaning. I think I should've started with the far right target so that I didn't have to pull the gun so far back to begin the move to the 2nd position. It felt like I was going to knock the barrels over trying to come out of there. 4th overall.

SUMMARY:

Good - I ran field courses strong. I think the practice for movement is starting to pay off. I went into the match thinking "practice pushing the speed". There seems to be a fine line between pushing too hard and relaxing too much. You only want to focus on the shot and fundamentals and let speed happen. But at the same time, unless you push the speed, you don't ever realize how fast you can go. I think the difference is the type of pressure. At major matches I'm thinking about each run as a step to 1st place. Not target A, sights, squeeze, move feet etc. etc. At this match, I didn't really think "must win", I just thought "can I snap the shot faster?" and tried it. As MD nobody got DQ'd, pissed off, or shot.

Bad - Best laid plans and all. Donnie (one of the GMs) asked me after 5 "Every time you walked that stage, you came into that port and flowed through it moving the whole way through. But when you shot it, your feet got stuck." I knew the second I moved my eyes back to the target after my reload my plan went wrong and I needed to deal with the situation. I didn't panic. I didn't focus on how stuck I was. But it happened anyway. These stages were sort of no brainers. Nothing to really test strategy (both a comment on my skills as MD and as shooter). It was pretty much run and gun. I would feel better about things if there were strategies involved. I.e. I chose the most efficient way to run a stage. This is something to work on as MD and as a shooter still.

My only mikes were because I didn't change gears. MUST identify gear changes and DO THEM. I did the identify part right, not so much the actual change. Too cocky.

Edited June 8, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE - 6/9/2008 - 10:00pm

I made a couple hundred rounds for Summer Blast. During a break I dry fired.

GOAL: Strong hand, Weak hand, Reloads. There will be strong and weak hand at the local mid-carolina this weekend as well as at Summer Blast.

Drills:

Draw and sight picture: warm up

2-2-2: quick transition practice and warm up

Strong hand draw:

Draw to weak hand:

Strong hand 2-2-2

Weak hand 2-2-2

Summary:

Felt good. Sights snapped where they should. No wiggle while "firing". I experimented with different grips strong and weak hand. Most experimentation was with grip strength and pressure points. I tried pressing the front strap so that the back seated into my palm firmly. Again, live fire will tell.

I had some "oh s#$%" moments switching hands from the draw to weak hand. Nothing dangerous, but unexpected. I was catching myself taking the safety off with my right hand before transferring. I have an ambi-safety so there is no nead to do this. I'd just hate to break a shot accidentally (I know practice). Also, while switching hands my right thumb ended up high and as I moved the hand to my chest out of the way my thumb hit the safety and disengaged.

Overall I felt better after a few minutes. The sights snapped to place strong and weak hand like they do freestyle. Just have to see "live fire".

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE - PREP FOR MID-CAROLINA 6/12/2008 10:00pm

Made a few hundred more rounds for Summer Blast and dry fired during a break.

GOALS:

Work strong hand/weak hand.

Eye focus and transitions

Reloads - slow reload hurt me over the weekend

Grip - I posted in the Handgun Techniques forum a problem I'm having with my grip where my trigger finger rubs the side of the frame and gives me a hell of a blister by the end of a match. I played with changing my strong hand to see if I could move my finger. I tried cocking my wrist more the the right. Stretching my fingers "down" or up to try to move my trigger finger away from the frame without adding tension to my finger. The only grip that moved my finger away was to move my strong hand down to resting on the magwell. I don't think this could possibly be good for recoil management. I'll need to try a different trigger... and tape my finger.

DRILLS:

Draw - Just a warm up

2-2-2 - warm up... eye focus

Draw strong hand

Draw weak hand

2-2-2 strong hand

2-2-2 weak hand

2-2-2 reload 2-2-2 free style

Movement drill - up and down hall on 1/3 size target on door

Table draw

Close target 2-2-2

SUMMARY:

Wow I didn't realize how much I did until I started writing it down. Primarily I focused on strong hand/weak hand, reloads, and movement. The other drills were just a few reps to warm up or a quick knock the rust off.

Strong hand/weak hand: I have mixed emotions about these drills. I played with grip pressure the last time I did these drills and tried to replicate what I learned. But I had a weird.. shake this time. I thought I learned the last time to press the front strap of the gun with my fingers so that if felt as if I were pressing the beavertail straight back into the V of my hand. This time it felt good, but I shook slightly. I backed off of the grip and the shake went away, but I didn't feel like I had a solid enough grip to manage recoil etc. If I let the gun can't just a little gangsta style I could reach a compromise between pressure and shake. I'm going to work this some more tonight. Overall it is starting to feel more natural. Again.. live fire will be the real test.

Reloads: I have moments of brilliance where I'm passing the falling mag with the new one and others where it goes completely fubar. I think I learned last night the key is to focus like a laser on the magwel. I keep the gun high in front of my face like I should. But I find I let my eyes kind of drift towards the grip. Yeah I'm looking in the general direction of the gun.. but I don't really shift my focus to the magwel from the target. It's like I try to split the difference. I fumble the most when I do this. I'd say out of 20 reps I probably fumbled 4 of them.

Movement: I felt really strong with this drill. Usually it takes me a couple of passes to settle the sights down. But this time the sights were dead on. I was able to push the speed of the groucho walk until the sights drifted off of the A zone. It was very useful to find that zone of "too fast" to be accurate. In the future this will be good to push the envelope and try to bump that "zone" up. I even had strong movement backwards for a change.

Table draw - meh. Good practice. I'm more interested in being solid with this skill than fast. I have yet to throw a gun and I don't want to start now. I focused on establishing my grip and pushing to extension. Eye focus on the gun. Make sure I have a solid pick up and index on the grip as my opportunity to "speed up". I.e. solid pick up no matter how fast, grip.. MOVE!

Close 2-2-2: I just want to make sure I respect the targets at all distances with this one. I focused on finding the sights. I let myself push the speed hard, but only if I saw the sights. At arms length, I'm ok just seeing the front sight, but I have a habit of not even seeing that. I tried to be super honest with myself and call just the front sight. If I couldn't, repeat. I caught myself slapping the trigger trying to move fast. BAD HABIT. I slowed back down and made myself do another 5 or so reps with proper trigger control and reset.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 7 - Felt like a strong session

OPPORTUNITIES:

Eye focus - both with transitions and reloads. Transitions are a continuous improvement process. Reloads I need to work on the fundamentals of the movement and MAKE SURE I LOOK AT THE MAGWELL. Maybe some burkett drills where you move the magazine to the magwell and stop to work on the appropriate focus.

Strong hand/Weak hand - I need to find a good grip that doesn't shake. More draw and 2-2-2 drills.

PHYSICAL TRAINING -

I slacked on the running this week because of heat advisories. Went to karate Tues and Wed. It's amazing how my mental state overlaps. Wed night was an eye opener for me. I got the CA-RAP kicked out of me.. literally. A couple of heavy hitters really worked me over. When I left, I was pretty shaken and upset. It's the closest I've come to quitting anything. I struggled with breathing and it really opened me up to get hurt. I couldn't tighten correctly when I took a hit because I was too busy sucking wind. I went into dry fire still feeling that slip in confidence.

[Lee King]

LOCAL MATCH MID-CAROLINA 6/14/2008

This was a quick match. Only 4 stages because of the heat. I had an AWESOME day!! I started off a little off-kilter because we had to switch squads at the last minute. I was scrambling to get mags loaded etc. It carried over to the 2nd stage of the day because I went from last shooter to 1st. But I actually handled it ok. Oh yeah.. and the strong hand/weak hand I heard about didn't happen. Wonder if it's because I said something about it in the diary a day or two ago...

I have a few videos of 3 stages I will link to for giggles.

SUMMARY: 1st C (woot!), 3rd Limited out of 17-18ish, I think I 9th overall (out of 40 something). Overall I was very consistent. I think I placed 9-11 (combined divisions) on all stages. I will need to double check the scores when they are posted.

Stage 4: Classifier - Can You Count

Not my best... not my worst... If I checked my score right I'm right about 52% on this one. EDIT- WHOA am I off on this!! I didn't check my score correctly. Try 67ish%

String 1 - decent reload - muffed a trigger reset after 2nd shot. I clearly didn't let the trigger out enough.

String 2 - sub 1 draw (Jack showed me on the timer), fumbled the reload.

WORK RELOADS... DO SOME BILL DRILLS TO WORK ON THE RESET.

Video:

Stage 1: 4 targets backing away from start position.. 4 to extreme left and around a wall. 5 steel and 2 paper in the middle and forward.

I felt really good about this one. I could've done a few things better. But overall I think my plan was good and my execution decent. I took the 1st 2 targets before I got my feet moving backing away. My plan was to immediately turn to the far right targets engaging those as I moved forward. You could see the 1st 2 immediately, the last 2 you had to lean around a wall to see. I turned, saw the 1st 2, took those moving to the corner. It felt smooth as if I finished the 1st as I started my lean. Moved back to the middle while reloading. Took an extra shot on 1 popper and 2 extras on another leaving it standing. Moved on to paper and came back for the last popper and nailed it. I felt good about the plan, and most of the stage. The poppers bugged me a little as I clearly had about 3-4 extra seconds. EDIT - Best stage of the day 3rd (in limited) .. 91.1% of 1st place on this one. < 2 Sec off 1st place time AND 1 point more.

NEED TO WORK ON STEEL.

Missed the video on this one because I was scrambling to get ready.

Stage 2: Very similar to stage 1 from last week. Barrier. 3 IPSC metric on left and a popper, same on right.

SA-LOW. For whatever reason I took my time on the metric targets. When watching the video my splits seem slower on this one than on a stage with a lot of movement. I didn't see the sight on the 2nd shot 1st target, or rather I glimpsed it and thought I pulled it left. I was processing the maybe miss while I went to the rest of the targets on the left. I hit it again when I started to move to the right side. Didn't need the makeup. Took an extra shot on the popper on the right. Ran it in 9.xx, should've been 7.xx. However, my time was similar last week.

Video:

NEED TO WORK ON SPLITS

Stage 3: Lot of movement. Turn and draw. 4 targets on left along left side berm. A port to the right with 4 behind it. Big gap. Barrier. 2 targets in the back on left and right, 2 targets immediately behind the barrier.

I feel like I had a decent plan on this one. I made a slight change when Jack shot BOTH back targets from the far left of the wall. If you hugged the right side fault line you could see the right target immediately behind the barrier at the end. My plan was to take it and the far right on the move and then move up to the left hand corner. But when I saw Jack hold the far right target until the end I took a good look at it. You were closer from that point, and you weren't moving making it easier to hit from there. BUT you had to lean WAY around the barrier to see it. I ran it Jack's way and I think it was better for me because I'm still learning the whole shoot on the move thing. BUT I think for a M/GM it would be the same either way. With my plan you still didn't need to move to the right corner. But risked missing the far paper on the move.

I turned, hit the first 3 of the 4 on the left while moving to the port. Once I turned I was in perfect position in the port. Took an extra shot on a target because I couldn't call the shot... it was close and I'm respecting all close targets... didn't need the makeup. I also waited to take the far left target in the port until last because if just felt more natural to hit it "on the way out". Came out of the port and hit the last paper on the left from the 1st array. Again, took an extra shot I didn't need because I couldn't call the shot. I waited to take this target because I felt I had better position further down range due to a no-shoot that obscured it at the start. And you had to go there anyway. I think it was a good call because I would've gotten stuck at the port trying to see around the no-shoot to take it before I turned to the targets in the port. Moved along the fault line, smooth reload. Hit the paper behind the barrier on the move. I felt like I had a miss and I can hear myself saying "Come on LEE!!" as I moved to the last position. Turns out I was right. Only M of the day. On this one I was already moving to the left and couldn't see the target anymore. I felt like a pause, move back in line, shoot would've taken too long. I'll have to play with the math to see.

This one felt good because I thought I made the right choices. When I saw Jack go fo the far right target from the left position I thought I didn't want shoot stuff on the move because I am learning the skill... I.e. don't want to use the skill inappropriately because it's new. You had to move to the corner anyway. Reinforces the idea that if you can hit a target from 2 positions, try to do it from the last to save movement. Also, a lot of shooters only took the 1st target on the left before moving to the port. They took the other 3 of that array after they came out of the port. I saw this as another feet sticker making you slow down on the movement towards the barrier. Then again, maybe I was too slow moving to the port while taking the 1st 3. I did feel a little sloppy with the extra shots.

CONTINUE SIGHT FOCUS AND TRANSITION DRILLS

Video:

Edited June 15, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE - 6/16/2008 9:00pm

Quick session. I limited the drills to skills I struggled with over the weekend and strong hand/weak hand

DRILLS:

Draw

Bill Drill

Reset Drill

Burkett reload (just to magwell, not seating)

Reload

Strong hand draw

Weak hand draw

2-2-2 strong and weak hand

SUMMARY:

Draw: warm up

Bill Drill - not sure how useful this one was. Without a "real" reset from firing I'm not sure I was learning anything. I did find the sights were wiggling so I need to work on my trigger control. Something about repeated trigger pulls I haven't really noticed before doing this.

Reset Drill: just a few reps because I'm not sure how useful this is without live fire.

Burkett Reloads: Focused on keeping the gun high. I noticed, after studying the videos from the week end, I have a tendency to start off high, but I bring the gun down to the mag as I bring the mag up. I keep it high until the mag hits the magwell. Then I "snap" my hands together to seat it. I think this adds too many variables right now. I really tried to focus on leaving the gun high.

Reload: Spent a lot of time on this one. I started off muffing a lot of reloads. Then I kind of had an epiphany. I decided to slow down and try to smooth out the motion. All the sudden I was actually loading faster and more reliably than I did "trying" to go fast. Smacking self in forehead RELAXED IS SMOOTH... SMOOTH IS FAST... rinse... repeat RELAXED IS SMOOTH... SMOOTH IS FAST... I probably did 30 more reps of this to reinforce the feel of smooth and relaxed.

Strong hand draw: Tried canting the gun just a bit. Started off feeling weak. I tried adding just a little tension in my arm. That REALLY made a difference. To me it feels like the old push/pull (minus the pull) type of grip. Again, I need live fire to see if this is effective.

Weak hand draw: Oddly enough this draw started stronger than strong hand. I think I was gripping the gun differently with this hand.

Strong/Weak 2-2-2: Good sight pictures. Solid. No shaking or wiggling by the time I did these. Need live fire to validate.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: Overall probably around a 6.5. I want to live fire to bring this up.

LIVE FIRE PLANNED FOR 6/18.

PHYSICAL TRAINING:

I was beat up after last Wed. night at karate. I didn't do much of anything until Mon. I ran at lunch. Plan to go to "regular" karate classes this week. I think I'm going to lay off of the big boy class for a while. I need to rebuild my confidence after the ass kicking last week. I'm going to get hurt unless I have some breakthroughs soon.

[Lee King]

6/17/2008 DRY FIRE - PREP FOR LIVE FIRE PRACTICE

Just a few drills before karate for about 10 minutes

Draw

Strong Hand/Weak Hand Draw

Movement

Had 2 things happen to pay attention to during live fire. First, during weak hand drills I caught myself slapping the gun from strong to weak hand. During one of the transfers I smacked the gun and hit the mag release dropping the mag The 2nd thing was also during weak hand drills. I did this before but I really paid attention to it this time. As I pulled my strong hand away, somehow I swept the ambi-safety and clicked it off. I think when my weak hand takes over, I kind of rub my hand away (like Mr Miagi in Karate kid) while pressing it into the weak hand. Spooky. Something to pay attention to.

PHYSICAL:

Karate. Regular class. Killer leg workout.

[Lee King]

LIVE FIRE - 6/18/2008 5:30pm

GOALS:

Strong hand/weak hand

Reload

Reset

DRILLS: Using 4 plates as targets

Ring the plate: warm up

Strong hand 1 on each plate

Weak hand 1 on each plate

5 reload 5: almost bill drill, but since we're doing "can you count" again at Summer Blast I modified it slightly.

Box to box movement with reload: ring the plate, run to box B while reloading, ring the plate

SUMMARY:

Strong hand: I caught myself lifting away from the shot or pressing into the shot. I think I was anticipating the shot and squeezing the whole hand instead of the trigger. I finally could force myself to relax and let the shot break instead of breaking the shot.

Weak Hand: Same deal. Took a lot of reps to get to relaxing and let the shot break naturally and quit squeezing with the whole hand.

Box to Box with reload: I started strong on this one, but for whatever reason I kept jamming my finger in the magwell. Not something

I normally do. I moved the boxes closer and closer to force myself to push it on the reloads. I also tried to work getting my gun up and ready to fire, staying low as I came into the last position. My goal was to break the shot right as I stepped in. I'm still not totally comfortable hitting a shot when I hit the 2nd box. It took me way more 2nd shots at the 2nd position than the 1st..

5 reload 5: My finger kept freezing. I did more reps of this one than I originally intended. I just wanted to do a couple to push the reset at speed. The last 5 rounds I just tried to draw, and pull the trigger smoothly and fast. My gun felt weird. I tried to unload and it stuck back. I had to beat it to get it to close. Then I couldn't get it to open. Turns out I broke the saddle of the guide rod. Snapped it in 1/2 and away from the "core" of the rod. Back to the SS rod that came with the gun. I honestly don't know if it really made a difference or not anyway. But I have less than 3k rounds on it. Knew it was a distinct possibility tungsten could break. It did.

OPPORTUNITIES:

More strong hand/weak hand

More reload on the move

More enter box movement.

Explode from box drills

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 6 I felt like I made big gains with strong hand weak hand. But I struggled with the steel a little. Basics seemed to slip just a tad.

PHYSICAL TRAINING:

Ran at lunch. BTW, my lunch time run consists of me running from my office down to the Battery and back. It's about 2.5 miles round trip.

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE 6/20/2008 - LOCAL STEEL CHALLENGE 6/21/2008

I'll cover both

20 minute dry fire session to prep for Steel Challenge. I focused primarily on surrender draw, transitions, and trigger control

I should've posted this earlier because I forgot all of the drills. So I'm going to skip to the SUMMARY:

I had a lot of trouble focusing on the sights. I either would focus on the sight and forget about transitions. Or I would perform good transitions and have weak at best focus on the sights. I want to laser in on the front sight after moving my eyes to the new target (followed by the gun). I can go fast, I can call the shots, but the sights are too "fuzzy" for my comfort.

To make matters worse, I started over swinging big time. I would call the shot on the A zone, but the sights would drift into the C. Bad follow through.

I ultimately brought it back around by slowing down. WAY too slow. I REALLY need to get a timer to be able to see if I'm really slowing down, or is this a perception thing.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 5... at best

STEEL CHALLENGE -

Dry fired the morning of the match hoping I would feel a little more confident going into the match. No such luck. Still over swinging.

I can't remember which stage was which, but I'll try. Also, scores haven't been posted so I'm trying to remember how I did. I shot both .22 and my Limited so I'll probably get them confused. We started on 4 so I'll start there:

Stage 4: 5 to go - I think

I was a little shaky on this one. I went slow and steady to get my hits. Focus on front sight. Transition to next plate. Front sight. So on and so on. I took a few extra shots, but all in all I was very consistent. I think I was in the 4's on this one. It seems like my throw away was either a 5.x or a low 6. EDIT - UPDATE Scores are in. 2 4's and 2 6's. 5th in LTD.

Rimfire, I cooked this one. I think they were all in the 3's. Well.. I cooked it considering I've never shot this .22 (or any) in a match before. EDIT - UPDATE 3, 4's and a 5. 2nd in rimfire

Stage 5: Roundabout - I think

Much more confident on this one. Again, just focused on fundamentals. I didn't worry about speed. I went 1 for 1 on a couple of passes. I think my times improved slightly on this one with a couple of 3's and the rest were 4's. EDIT - 1 3, couple of 4s, and a 5. 5th LTD

Rimfire 4 in the 3's. 1 was a sub 3 run. It was weird, I seemed to be able to just put the front sight on a plate and squeeze and I would hit it. The sight picture on my limited gun needs to be much more precise. EDIT - 2.81, rest were 3's. 1st in rimfire

Stage 1: Smoke and Hope

Fun stage. I kept over swinging on #2. I was trying to go too fast. It was essentially the same problem I had dry firing. I would call the "hit" but my follow through would drift off. Both times I missed #2 I went onto 4,3 back to 2 and stop. I can't remember which gun, but I had 4 sub-3's on this one. I got to the last run and felt confident about the first 4 and really tried to push the speed. With both guns the last run was my throw away. REMEMBER - you can only shoot as fast as you can see! But it felt good to try to push hard even if the run was my throw away. EDIT - Consistent 3's across the board in LTD. 3rd. In rimfire all 2's 2nd.

Stage 2: Pendulum

Ok FIRST, who designed this hell? SECOND, who the hell put it right after Smoke and Hope?!? Uggh... easily the worst stage of the day. My first run was in double digits. Over-confident. I tried to go too fast. My 2nd run wasn't much better. I think I might have averaged in the 8 or 9's on this one. I was all over the place. An 11 on 1 run. A 6 on another. LOTS of misses.EDIT - 10th in LTD. 2 7's a 9 and a 10.

Rimfire was much better (of course). I was pretty consistent in the upper 5's and 6's on this one. Again, I'm surprised at how I just put the big honkin fiber on the plate and squeeze, almost like an open gun. EDIT - rimfire 3,4,5,6 7th.

Stage 3: Speed Option

I have no clue how I did on this one. I think I took an extra shot on 2 of 3 runs. I'm pretty sure I took 2 extras on maybe another run. I couldn't tell you what my times were because someone, ahem, perhaps an "angry drunk", ahem, started screwing with me by calling out bogus times. They would write the correct time down, then tap the timer and call out 1-3 extra seconds. So I was hearing "7.45, 9.62". When I think I was in the 5's. Honestly, by the time I got to the last run I was pretty much saying "F@#$ it. My day is shot. Just hit the things and let's go home". I went SA-LOW on my last run. EDIT - better on this than I remember. 5th LTD. 4,5, 2 6's.

Again, rimfire was so much better. Point and shoot. Don't know what those times were either because I think they were still calling out bogus times. But they felt strong. Sub 4's and consistent. EDIT - 2 3's, 2 4's. 1st

SUMMARY:

I always walk away from a Steel Match feeling pretty crappy about my shooting. I would really like to see the scores to see if it's just me or if everyone has the same issues. I am wondering if my zero changed slightly. I ran out of Montana Golds and switched to the lead bullets I use for practice. I think I'll double check during live fire this week. EDIT 6th in LTD out of 20. 2nd in Rimfire out of 13.

OPPORTUNITIES:

Lon g range marksmanship. On Speed Option, the stop plate was at 25 yards. The bays were too short for the full 35 called for in the stage diagrams. This could really be a factor in VA. And obviously pendulum kicked my ass.

Gear change: I need to recognize when to push the speed (Smoke and Hope) and when to just hit the plate (pendulum). This is something that always bites me. I need to consciously plan my gear changes.

PHYSICAL TRAINING:

I actually skipped dry fire Thurs night because Karate was such an ass kicker. I don't know if I inspired the new level of.. pain.. torture.. but the Sensei said he's going to focus on getting our conditioning up. The class was 100% exercise. I got stuck in the "big boy" group. We rotated through each exercise with 20 lb weights in each hand (as opposed to the other groups with 12 and 4lbs). This was as close as I've come to puking.

SIDE NOTE:

I also got a "Skills Test" from Mike Seeklander from Shooting Performance (http://www.shooting-performance.com/index.html). I'm pretty stoked about running these. It will probably take me a few range sessions to go through them because there are a LOT of tests. But they look fun. SHAMELESS PLUG - be sure to go check out the site. He's providing an awesome service for free. I'm still astounded at the level of effort he's putting into that site. He has gone so far as to follow up with my training (and even reading this diary) via e-mails. Not to mention you're getting a training plan from one of the top shooters in the world.

Edited June 25, 2008 by Lee King

[Lee King]

DRY FIRE 6/23/2008 - 7:30pm

GOALS: Sight focus, transitions

Spent the session trying to snap to the targets since I struggled over the weekend.

DRILLS:

Draw relaxed

Draw surrender

2-2-2

Mix of targets

Turn and draw

90 degree turn and draw

Movement

SUMMARY:

Much better overall. I really spent time working on eye focus during transitions. The gun snapped onto a target much more naturally without the over swing. I was even lasering in on the front sight better. I don't understand why, one day I'm working on fine tuning fundamentals, then the next it feels like I'm starting over.

Draws - warm up. Did 10 or so reps of relaxed draw then surrender draw. I'm still working on breaking the shot at extension. This is going to take a while.

2-2-2 - Transitions felt good. I even noticed proper eye focus. Calling the shots on the A zone. No wander or over swing.

Turn and draw - I was catching myself leaning back so that I was almost off balance. This was causing the sights to move WAY too much before settling. I focused on smoothing the turn. I also did a few reps of turn the "wrong" way focusing on holding the draw until I was all the way around. This is something on the skills test from Seeklander so I thought I'd snap a few.

90 turn and draw - Again another thing on the skills test. Never seen it before so I thought I'd try.

Movement - I feel like the sights are snapping to the target faster and settling faster. I'm learning to time the trigger pull during the "bounce". I need to work on pausing for a shot if it moves out of sight. I overran a target at MC last weekend because I was focusing on moving and not "appropriate" movement. You can't shoot it if you cant' see it.

MENTAL CONFIDENCE: 7 - I felt much better about sight focus and transitions. I'm seeing imrpovement.

PHYSICAL TRAINING -

Meant to run at lunch but I left my shoes at home. Karate Tues night.

[WTWick]

I have a good friend that always tells me, "Dry fire, dry fire, dry fire!" It's good to know he actually does it. =o

[Lee King]

I have a good friend that always tells me, "Dry fire, dry fire, dry fire!" It's good to know he actually does it. =o

Hmmm... I'm reminded of a good friend who taught me to play pool.... practice, what a novel idea huh?