TargetTalk

What level can one expect to achieve by natural progression - ie the point which a shooter may naturally achieve without the aid of coaching/advanced training and over what period of time.

ie shooting ISSF 25m Standard Pistol would I reasonably be expected to reach a score of XXX out of 600 in 3mths/6mths/12mths/Longer.

Cheers

David

There's no one simple answer, everyone is different. It's a fair bet that you'll get better than you started out being - but that's about all I'd guarantee.

Rob.

I agree with Rob there are way too many factors to predict ones progression. Things such as natural ability, which would factor in muscle tone, aerobic fitness level, vision, fine motor skills, hand eye co-ordination, your ability to concentrate, your ability to preform repetitive task perfectly over and over again. Then there is also the training, how much time do you dedicate to training, what you work on during training, your ability to access your skill level and make adjustments to your training.

One usually finds that the initial improvement is quite fast as you shoot more and more, as you get better the progression slows then plateaus. This is where coaching is important (or personal knowledge) because things need to be changed to reach a higher level, shooting isn't all about volume, its about doing the right things to move on.

Can i ask how long you have been shooting. All i can say is learning to shoot is the easy part learning to shoot under pressure is where it gets tricky for me. I have been shotting for about 13 months and i am a junior. In that time i have only shot air. I just started shooting free. during training at club after about 6 months i could shoot 540. within 12 months i could shoot high 550s low 560s. Now I can shoot high 560s but yet to break 570. at open compertition on the other hand after 6 months i could only shoot 520s after 12 months i shot 555. at this point that is my highest open score. but this will all vary a lot from person to person

I'm 48 and I've had 7 sessions..... Session 5 - 404, Session 6 - 463, Session 7 - 485. The rapid fire stuff has been my downfall to date :)

In target archery it was generally considered that one could reasonably expect to achieve a 900 FITA (out of 1440) within 12 month at which point more serious training in technique etc would be required for steady improvement. I believe this was based on 'normal' progression of physical development and the use of basic technique.

higginsdj wrote:I'm 48 and I've had 7 sessions..... Session 5 - 404, Session 6 - 463, Session 7 - 485. The rapid fire stuff has been my downfall to date :)

In target archery it was generally considered that one could reasonably expect to achieve a 900 FITA (out of 1440) within 12 month at which point more serious training in technique etc would be required for steady improvement. I believe this was based on 'normal' progression of physical development and the use of basic technique.

There's no equivalent for ISSF Standard Pistol I'm afraid. Some people might reach 520 in a year, others 560+. It depends on so many factors, not least of which is the amount of training you do.

Putting a time factor in your progression makes this impossible to answer. Score averages will climb as skills progress, but how fast depends on the individual. More predictable are the score plateaus of the averages that take additional input to hurdle.

So one might say that 'natural progression' will see a general increase of scores but rather than a particular score one looks for a plateau as the indicator of a need to coaching/advancement of technique. Makes perfect sense :)

You will still plateau with coaching. I have a full time coach, well more a mentor and advise giver. This would be my advise. many people who will tell you they will give you coaching lessons will not be of that much help. they will help a beginner quiet a bit but after that you will learn a lot more from talking to top level shooters and coaches and even some people who have never been a good shooter but have been around the shooting scene a long time. the trick is to be able to sift through the information you are given. you will get a lot of good information and a lot of useless information.

I doubt I will ever be given 'useless' information. I think the trick will be to try and see what works for me.

Cheers

David

If it takes you 3 months to figure out it was not suitable for you, then I would call it useless, at our age you dont need to be wasting to much time.

your goals will determine your plan of attack.
to be on the nat team in say 4 yrs you need a good coach from day one.
to break grade, everything you need is in here, just need to read.

enrol in as many coaching sessions as you can, maybe in sydney. they just had a rapid training session.

wouldnt worry to much about rapid till you can shoot profficiently in non timed events, learn to many bad habits.

I got to mid 540's in comp in rapid after a few months, but realised I need to build a better base to work from.
I set goals to reach in air before I looked at a rapid target again, so just shot air for last 12 months.
soon I will start just the 8 sec runs till I have good technique, 6 and 4 sec runs will just be quicker.
unlike the rush I was in before due to poor technique.

"natural progression" is something like this:

first gun a Hammerli 230 (in 1975, I think), scores in the 550/560's quite soon.

While playing tennis found had problems seeing the ball at the other side of the court. Had glasses made.

Scores jumped to 560/570 almost immediatelly.

Bought an IGI Domino ('77) along with 20k rounds of Elley. Was 3rd in the first (and supposedly only) selection for the World Champs and Moscow Olympics. After threatening to shoot out the target controlling eletronics, since the administration said I was not elegible for the selection. Others shooters protested and I was able to shoot.

Another selection was made in few weeks with the sole objective of taking me out. Came out 4th.

A third one was shot, in the morning after meeting THE most beautifull girl of my 20's...(should have had dinner at home, alone...) came out 5th. Stopped shooting for 31 years, came back last June. The same group held the national governing body until begining of this year.

Shooting air, grip considered good since last month, scoring in the 540's and climbing.

Anything natural in this?

Cheers!!

Progression seems to come for me when I had a mental breakthrough and I don't think there was any thing natural about it. In fact, I dont think there is anything natural about holding a device at the end of your arm and expecting a small explosion to occur without any reaction by the holdee.The same applies to the rifle as the explosion is even closer to the shooters eye. I believe shooting is one of the most unnatural acts we can attempt to perform and yet we persist until we master the act and do so with real precision. Do not quit as amazind results can come to pass. Good Shooting Bill Horton

I just did a little chart of how my shooting has progressed so far....

Little hard to read but the blue is for my ISSF smallbore prone and the black is ISSF air rifle.

Graph on side is suppose to go from 520 to 590 and on bottom June 07 to Dec 08

I suppose I have progressed fairly fast considering I just started this type of shooting a year and half ago...

As a novice and not 'owing' a gun I found progession somewhat erratic. I get access to a pistol once a week (at best) to shoot for about an hour (at best). When I shoot the same pistol on consecutive weeks I see my scores improve. A Change in pistol sees a marked decline on it's first use then an improvement the next week. So a large part of the progresssion seems to be also consistancy of pistol (perhaps directly related to consistancy of grip, trigger position, weight, etc etc etc)

So basically, until I have my own pistols, I don't think I even should try to measure progression through scores.

Shooting well is all about consistency, with out a dedicated pistol, it will be difficult to get any sort of consistency, triggers are different grips are different, weight and balance are different. Plus with out your own pistol it makes important things like dry firing impossible.

bryan wrote:If it takes you 3 months to figure out it was not suitable for you, then I would call it useless, at our age you dont need to be wasting to much time.

your goals will determine your plan of attack.
to be on the nat team in say 4 yrs you need a good coach from day one.
to break grade, everything you need is in here, just need to read.

enrol in as many coaching sessions as you can, maybe in sydney. they just had a rapid training session.

wouldnt worry to much about rapid till you can shoot profficiently in non timed events, learn to many bad habits.

I got to mid 540's in comp in rapid after a few months, but realised I need to build a better base to work from.
I set goals to reach in air before I looked at a rapid target again, so just shot air for last 12 months.
soon I will start just the 8 sec runs till I have good technique, 6 and 4 sec runs will just be quicker.
unlike the rush I was in before due to poor technique.

Well said. When you are starting the best advise i think you could receive is learn to crawl before you walk. Shoot air before other matches. I as i mentioned i have been shooting for just over 12 months and in this time i have only shot air. I shot 50m pistol for the first time ever 2 weekends ago at the Youth national championships, where i got second. there were many other juniors there that have been shooting a lot longer than me but have been just shooting all matches that couldnt even nearly hold the black. when my father started shooting, when air wasnt a ver common event, he started in a club that mainly only shot rapid fire. before he was aloud to shoot any rapid fire he had to shoot a possible in standard. much of the time this ment he was the only one shooting standard while every one was shooting rapid. after he shot it he had to shoot a possible at 8 before shooting 6, a possible at 6 before shooting 4. Not a lot of people got to shoot 4 seconds, but it worked. Out of a 4 man state team 3 were from his club and the next best person outside the team was also from his club. He went on to make the national team for rapid fire. If you can learn really good trigger controll plus hold ect. through air its most likely the fastest way to improve

Its all well and good to recommend starting in Air but it all depends on what types of pistols are available to probies. At my club there are .22 cal pistols available so thats where we start. With small clubs its also very much dependant on attendances ie who is available to shoot with Probies. (it can't be just anyone)

In another 5 months, once I have my License and Permit to acquires sorted/approved then I will be able to look at AP, but in the mean time we have to shoot with what we have access to.

Cheers

David

you can always short cut things, you could get some1 in your club to purchase a pistol and put it in their name and transfer it over at the end of your 6 months

higginsdj wrote:Its all well and good to recommend starting in Air but it all depends on what types of pistols are available to probies. At my club there are .22 cal pistols available so thats where we start. With small clubs its also very much dependant on attendances ie who is available to shoot with Probies. (it can't be just anyone)

In another 5 months, once I have my License and Permit to acquires sorted/approved then I will be able to look at AP, but in the mean time we have to shoot with what we have access to.

Cheers

David

I don't know about Australia but many clubs in my area have probationary periods as well, the main purpose is to give the new shooter some exposure to various disciplines and make sure they are of decent calibre to belong to the club and understand the safety rules.

In all honesty for the most part this time really isn't conducive to training to become a better shooter. I suggest you just enjoy the experience learn what you can, when you pass your probationary period then is the time to seriously train if that's what ou want to do.