TargetTalk

Looking for some help...

My daughter shoots smallbore and we have the luxury of her rifle team using the Orion scoring system. This gives us the ability to look at her practice shots and analyse them anyway we see fit.

Curious what 'metrics' are popular to use to gauge how a shooting session went. And to use as goals, for future practice sessions, etc...

Example:
Spread Measurement - largest distance between 2 shots. Can put that into a chart and map out last 10 targets. Also a simplistic number, that she would be trying to 'best' at the next practice.

She tries to make deals before practice [she's 13] and if she reaches the goal I take her out for ice cream. Scores & tens were fine when she was shooting low scores. Now we need to find another number or number(s) that she can use.

Orion comes out with group size - that's another possibility. But it's a 90% estimation ellipse, so harder to use for goal setting .

So, curious what you guys look at.... All the number s in SCATT - which ones do you look at when regarding shot placement [not movement]. If using electronic scoring what information do you take advantage of, to help you practice better?

Just my opinion, but scores and tens are still fine for metrics, but also start adding the lowest scored shots.

So if she shoots a the same score, the one with fewer low score shots shows improvement. Say you have a 40 shot match, a score of 320 could be all eights, or half tens half sixes. So decreasing the number of low score shots is what I think is the best logical step until it's all 9s and 10s. One of my personal goals is to not shoot any 8s in a session (air rifle). I won't beat myself up for a nine, but I know my air rifle and pellets are capable of all tens, so the limiting factor is me.

If she is already all 9s and 10s, then group size is fine. At that point she should be focusing on shooting to the potential of the rifle/ammo combination.

Jimro

I would say you can either use overall score, or something similar to what Jimro said. However I'm going to suggest that instead of keeping track of the poor shots, keep track of the good ones! Count the 10's! I find that counting the positives and focusing on what you do right really helps to build up your self-image as a shooter and I will always try to take away a positive rather than a negative. Every time you add a 10, you're saying to yourself that you did something right, making you feel like a better shooter. Every time you add a non-10, you're saying you did something wrong, and subconsciously you're going to feel like not that great of a shooter. If you feel like you're a better shooter, you're probably going to start shooting like a better shooter. It's weird how the mind works sometimes.

I would also suggest not scoring every target in a practice session for "record." Have her work on skills for most of the practice, and don't take those scores too seriously. Then at the end of practice, designate one or two strings that you will use as "record targets" that you will use to determine whether or not you're going for ice cream, or just to use to track progress. Otherwise, the shooter will be hesitant to try new things, which will limit their potential for improvement.

Best of luck!

Ryan

Two things I look at that can tell you how a session went ... not even looking at the score

1) look at the group size as denoted by grey area on the printout. The smaller the better, obviously. In addition here is the wobble --- up & down, side-to-side, angled. Can point to position errors or imbalances in the position. Look for the outliers ... those can be the shots where the mental focus broke down.

2) Where is the center of the group? (the crosshair on the printout) If the group is not in the center or at least well within the 9 ring then have your shooter adjust after each shot at least 1 click after every shot until they get to the point where a month or so of practices that group is centered.
AFTER that group is centered, OK then maybe look at the score.