TargetTalk

So, I have decided to get involved in 10m AP shooting. Until today, I never measured my garage. I knew it was long enough for the cars, and had an office on the end besides. Now I find out, I only have 26 feet. If I use the dining room, family room, and hall, I can get just about 30 feet with no structural changes. So my question is, if I practice at a reduced range, with a scaled down target -- will that cause me to develope bad habits, that will have to be corrected, when I finally get to shoot at a full 10m? Thanks ---- Jim

try diagonally across the garage

maybe opening a window and putting the pellet trap just outside might work

good shooting

Poole

Shooting on the diagonal is a great suggestion if you are concerned with getting the full 10 meters.

As far as shooting at 26 - 30 feet, the reduction from full distance should not cause any bad habits to form. The mechanics of the shot are the same regardless and you are not dealing with wind on an indoor range.

What will be different is your sight setting. You will need a few clicks of elevation (maybe windage if you shoot with a cant but this is doubtful) to center up. You will need appropriately sized targets as well.

A potential negative might be your mental preparation. You might find yourself THINKING you are at a disadvantage when shooting the full distance. If you think you are disadvantaged, you most undoubtedly will be.

I shoot AR for practice for the standing stage of over the course service rifle competition. I shoot at 6 meters using a reduced target inside my house due to room constraints. I also shoot in the garage (depends on the temperature) where I shoot at the full 10 meters.

I have all my shots tracked in a spreadsheet. After about 10 months of tracking the 6m and 10m separately I noticed there were no statistically significant difference in either of the scores. This is what worked for me. I hope it helps.

I am sure that reduced distance does not cause any "bad habits". The only problem I see is that you should reduce also the height of the target respectfully to Tales rule and should use CORRECTLY reduced targets if you want see your results as comparable to 10m distance. The Excel file allowing to recalculate rings you can find at my HIGH NOON postal competition web page:
http://omega.pol.lublin.pl/highnoon/highnoon.htm

I would suggest to NOT shoot on diagonal... Then bad habit can really arrive! You lose your feeling of a trget line and moving to the real range you will get troubles to find your position. Better shoot at 30 feets but stright.

There is a difference when reduced distance is used - your results should increase when you switch to the 10m distance :-) Have fun, and I particularly invite you to shoot for the High Noon postal ! Looking forward to your score,

Grzegorz

Thanks for the info. I have already checked out your site, and downloaded the reduction software. Could you explain the theory behind your statment that your scores would actually go up, when you switched to the regulation distance? Thanks again ---- Jim

I would disagree and suggest that diagonal is OK. But you will need to convince your mind that it is straight. Something like creating a single white line from you to the target or a small rectangle over the same should suffice. You obviously also need to angle both shooting bench and target.

Rob.

I went and measured the diagonal in the garage -- I still can't get 10m. I can come closer in the house, but without any structural work, I only get 30 feet.

I strongly disagree with all of those who claim you will not develop "bad habits."

Read some literature on the shot process and how your mind/body learns to shoot a ten; I recommend Yur'Yevs book as a start. Your subconcious needs to program the amount of "lead timing" for trigger release at the right moment. This lead timing will be different for different distances- reduced size targets, scaled hight requirement etc. is o.k. to worry about but much less relevant than this other issue.

Analogy: Hit thousands of slow pitch softballs at the practice range in preparation for a match where fast pitch baseballs will be used.

Your timing will be wa-a-a-a-ay off.

Steve Swartz

Hmmm . . . on second thought . . . I'm not sure my first answer was right. Angular error etc. etc. with everything being scaled properly- dry fire with a Rika, Scatt, Noptel, etc. should be a "wash."

Live fire? Might be a slight shot release timing difference; probably not enough to notice AND probably the difference between the two sets of errors would be random and circular.

Therefore, please disregard everything after "I strongly disagree" in the previous post!

Ooops. Had a lot on my (feeble) mind lately . . .

Steve

Just go ahead and shoot! Approx. one meter won't make a huge difference. My home range is 26 ft in length, as yours is. When I switch to 10m (at the club), I have virtually no shift in the point of impact. Sight your gun for the home range. You will soon reap the benefits of regular practice. When you do shoot at 10m, you might have to adjust your sights slightly, but the benefits of all that practice will still be there. Don't worry about 1m here or there.

I agree with the "just shoot" advice. If shooting on a diagonal is going to throw your "mental" game off, then maybe you should be putting more work into your mental game instead of worrying about getting a few more feet out of your garage.