TargetTalk

Curious. What realization about your position or technique in standing allowed a breakthrough that led to great improvement.

Apart from many things you will read here soon, I'd like to point out one thing
http://www.targettalk.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=49551
Yes, same cant angle is important. But even more important is NOT correcting it if you find it as a too much in this or that direction. You may succesfully do it once, or even ten times. But at the end, it will take its revenge as a fatigue and lack of concentration. And some poor shots as an effect.
If you see that rifle has incorrect cant, either shoot it anyway if you know what are you doing, or just put it down, regroup and try again later ;)

mmajora wrote:Apart from many things you will read here soon, I'd like to point out one thing
http://www.targettalk.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=49551
Yes, same cant angle is important. But even more important is NOT correcting it if you find it as a too much in this or that direction. You may succesfully do it once, or even ten times. But at the end, it will take its revenge as a fatigue and lack of concentration. And some poor shots as an effect.


If you see that rifle has incorrect cant, either shoot it anyway if you know what are you doing, or just put it down, regroup and try again later ;)

Ehh???

If it's not right put it down start again .. ALWAYS!!


Why give away points if you can see it's not right...


A good shot abort process is a revelation to most shooters I've coached. Being able to say 'no' to yourself instead of 'I can make it' followed by an expletive when it's a nine or worse will do wonders for your confidence in standing. That and good follow through...

Practice.

My biggest change was realizing I was exhaling on the shot, and dropping shots low. This was 30 years ago, when we still learned to shoot while holding "half a breath". I began shooting in the natural respiratory pause", and coaching other s to do the same. That is now the accepted method.

My single most important revelation was to create a position in equilibrium. This might sound as such a basic fact which everyone would know but before I reached one, I hadn't understood the importance of it. Together with the equilibrium, the path and guidance I received to develop this position is what taught me the most. Standing went from my least favourite position to my most favourite one. I still consider this to be one of the most fundamental facts in the standing position and where I start when coaching someone else.

remmy223 wrote:
If it's not right put it down start again .. ALWAYS!!


Why give away points if you can see it's not right...

That's the thing. What you wrote here is a bit higher level that my advice. But my is more appropriate for novice and beginners. Once I told one girl "if you don't see it right, put it down". What "right" means was discussed already, but in practice, she had terrible problem with finishing her ar40. And step by step loosing her confidence in what she is doing, she did like 360, while most of the time she was doing 373 - 376.

edit: typos, grammar.

Thanks for the replies. It gives me something to think about to prepare meaningful practice sessions for my juniors.

Not putting my head down right away on the cheek piece was the biggest help for me in standing. Watch the top shooters, a great many of them pick up the rifle, take some breaths and let the gun settle as close to the target as possible befor putting their head down. The ways of the rifle goes into explicit detail as to the procedure and reason for doing so. Also, dry firing at home on the days when I didn't have practice.

-Zach

oldbulldog wrote:Curious. What realization about your position or technique in standing allowed a breakthrough that led to great improvement.

It might seem blindingly obvious, but my breakthrough was stopping myself pulling the trigger when my aim was going off the bull.

To explain a bit more, I've generally been fairly good at gently increasing pressure on the trigger while I am sighted on bull, but would sometimes twitch my trigger finger if I saw the sight moving away from bull, with the inevitable low score for that shot. It was like I released the shot automatically with a jerk while trying to stop myself pulling the trigger. By doing lots of practice dry firing I've now managed to train myself away from doing that (most of the time!).

Fortunately I've not (yet!) suffered from the similar but rather different problem of I've-been-standing-here-waiting-for-ages-for-this-shot-to-sight-exactly-on-the-bull-and-I-know-that-it's-still-not-there-but-I've-got-fed-up-waiting-so-I'm-going-to-pull-the-trigger-anyway.

Humpers wrote:
Fortunately I've not (yet!) suffered from the similar but rather different problem of I've-been-standing-here-waiting-for-ages-for-this-shot-to-sight-exactly-on-the-bull-and-I-know-that-it's-still-not-there-but-I've-got-fed-up-waiting-so-I'm-going-to-pull-the-trigger-anyway.

Well this is really a curse. I'm sometimes a bit lazy, and it's look like "Hey, it will be 9. Yes, 9. No, not 10. Would you please move yourself a bit forward? No? Why not? Oh, so you'll wait. See? 9. So, could you please move a bit before we start, or maybe we go through once again while in position?". Probably what differs novice from advanced is the moment of decision -> good input of remmy223 goes here.

Whew! That's an awful lot of stuff to be going through your mind at a time when your attention (which can only be on ONE thing at a time) needs to be either on sight picture, or trigger control

My best success in coaching OH shooters has been to keep all "words" out of the brain after establishing the NPA, and replace them with a "picture" of what you want (either the "perfect sight picture, or the pellet going through the ten dot), and letting the un-consious part of the mind take care of the trigger. (Seems to work better focusing on an aggressive trigger opperation, and letting the sighting become automatic with pistols).

It takes a little practice, but leads to the "auto-magical" shots that are deep tens.

A few things:

1) making sure hips are aligned with the target straight on and consistently from shot to shot
2) consistent elbow placement on the hip/side of the body
3) shot rejection
4) followthrough
5) most important - focusing on the center of the target and my hold, not the trigger pull.

Happy shooting!

Ryan

I've been focusing on your 1/ consistency, trying to find the cause of a wandering npa.

Where exactly should the sights come to rest after the first big movement ( ie putting the rifle up) - like how far above the target dot?

When properly set up your sights should rest around the bull. (Perfect sight picture). If you are too high, shorten the distance between your feet slightly (3/8" is often plenty).

As Pat said, let your eyes pull the trigger (reflex action when the sight picture is correct). Canting the rifle to my eye rather than the other way around helped steady the hold. NPA, NPA, & NPA. Learning to relax into the position while holding a heavy rifle seems counter-intuitive, but it is critical. One evening shooting air rifle in the basement I realized I had always had a tight back muscle; relaxed it and put five pellets in one hole. I work at a steady hold, long enough to break the shot. Others break the shot while deliberately moving across or up the target; whatever works best for you.

Mark

A big thing I could say, but often not do, was putting the rifle down and starting over again, if the sight picture was not good. I often forced bad shots. I actually learned, or better said appreciated, putting the rifle down by shooting next to one of the best shooters in the country. Takes discipline to set it down.

TerryKuz wrote:A big thing I could say, but often not do, was putting the rifle down and starting over again, if the sight picture was not good. I often forced bad shots. I actually learned, or better said appreciated, putting the rifle down by shooting next to one of the best shooters in the country. Takes discipline to set it down.

I have to agree that learning to reject shots and putting the rifle down is one of the hardest things to do. The thing is you force the shot anyway, kowing that it will end up with poor results, so why not do the right thing to start with?

Alan

Relaxation of my supporting arm