TargetTalk

Brenton, what is happening is that you are healing shots. This occurs mainly when you are trying to force the gun into a hold area after the optimum hold time has passed. In plain words, the ego is trying to force a shot, and the sub-conscience has already determined that the pistol should be put down on the bench. As the sights are moving back to the hold area, you are trying to force the trigger to release, thus releasing the trigger as the pistol is moving. High is a result of forcing the gun up, right is a result of snatching at the trigger.

For the record. yes you need to know the root cause of shooting errors, this is the only way to correct them. Only natural, when you see a mistake, make corrections. That is not to say that you should be fixated on mistakes. Think positive, but think smart about you errors.

Any Noob will tell you that you can't correct a mistake if you don't know how you made it. Good shooting.

An excellent analysis Greg. I appreciate your having spelled out heeling so clearly.

I also understand your frustration with Russ' repeated insistence that thinking about one's errors is 'wrong' somehow. A complete practitioner in any art must know all, good bad and indifferent, if they are to be sufficiently aware to advance to the highest level. If a musician keeps making the same mistake in a critical passage, do they try not to think about it and only focus on what they do well, in hope that their performance will magically improve? Of course not. An orchestral musician trying that stunt will quickly find themselves browsing the want ads for a new position. Understanding is key, in everything. And of course in pistol shooting one goes beyond mere understanding, again as with any art, allowing the basics to become as much as possible a part of one's anatomy, one's instincts. Just the same, a musician straining to think out each and every note will not be able to render anything musical for an audience. One must understand, then transcend.

I do love the way people think they can diagnose a fault just by knowing where the erroneous shots fell. I don't disagree that under some circumstances the error could be due to the processes you describe, but equally it could be 1, 2 or more other problems.

As a shooter Brenton, you must watch the sights and see what's happening when you release the trigger. As I also mentioned dry firing can be a great diagnostic and positive reinforcement tool.

Rob.

Heeling is one of a number of issues that could be causing Brenton's shots to move like that. Without seeing his shot process take place, there is no way to tell exactly what's happening to cause the error's in his shots.

There is nothing wrong with analysing a shot to come up with aspects of the shot processes that you want to improve on. However to think about what causes a poor shot will have a negative effect on what you are doing.

A simple analogy is for me to say "don't think about pink elephants." What's the first thing that pop's into your head? If you're anything like 95% of the population its a nice, cute pink elephant.

The same applies in shooting. If you think "I must stop heeling" your subconscious mind will not interoperate that the same way as your conscious mind. The only thing you're subconscious will take from that thought is "heeling." From there you can guarantee the next thing you will do when performing your shot process is heel the shot.

There is nothing wrong with know the causes of poor shots. However to think about them when you're actually on the line is counter productive. When you are shooting the only thoughts you want are those that will create a good shot process.

These come down to expanding upon your basic techniques. A very short version of my process (slow fire) works like this.

Stance is stable
Grip applies pressure from front to back and wrist is locked.
Address target
Raise pistol, breathe in
Soft focus on where the sights are as lowering into aiming area, breathe out
commence press
pause, breath in
lower to aiming area, breathe in, increase focus to full commitment to sights
align sights in aiming area
subconsciously feel trigger pressure increasing, smoothly
*shot breaks
continue to align sights
continue to feel trigger pressure increasing
check grip pressure is consistent to when I started the shot
lower pistol

My aim is to perform each of these steps to the best of my ability. If I do that the shot will be in the middle of the card every time. If I make a mistake during these processes or leave some out, the shot usually will not be in the middle of the card.

If you know that you have deviated from what they know to be a correct shot process, you need to have the discipline to abort the shot and start again. Not as easy as it sound, I know. If you can do this you are left with potential errors in releasing the shot. These can be eliminated by simply feeling the trigger pressure consistently and constantly increasing until the shot breaks.

The way you correct the mistake is simply by focusing on what creates a good shot. You can't gain anything by thinking about your mistakes so why bother.

Good luck

Most of the actions required to fire a good shot can be done consciously & consecutively. Lastman's list shows this. The catch is here:

"subconsciously feel trigger pressure increasing, smoothly
*shot breaks "

You can't do this consciously. You have to train until that becomes subconscious. He also omits (at least explicitly) that you have to SIMULTANEOUSLY maintain sight alignment & sight picture AND squeeze the trigger until the shot breaks.

You cannot fire a good shot as a sequential act of single steps. The real trick of shooting accurately is learning to do two things at once: keep the sights lined up properly AND fire the shot without disturbing that alignment.

After some initial work to ingrain the sequential bits, if someone is having problems, the VAST majority of them boil down to failing to do one of the two above things simultaneously. Diagnosing your bad shots at least to the level of "is it my sight alignment?" or "is it my trigger control?" will aid a lot in deciding what to work on in your training. If you are watching the target, or can't focus on your sights due to lighting or eye issues, dry firing 1000 times a day won't help.

Once you have identified the source of your problems, you can concentrate on taking corrective positive action. Instead of just "practicing", you can try drills & exercises that specifically address the areas you are having difficulty with. THAT is why it is useful to understand why your shots are going astray.

Greg Derr wrote: For the record. yes you need to know the root cause of shooting errors, this is the only way to correct them. Only natural, when you see a mistake, make corrections. That is not to say that you should be fixated on mistakes. Think positive, but think smart about you errors.

Any Noob will tell you that you can't correct a mistake if you don't know how you made it. Good shooting.

Greg is exactly correct.

I was coaching a new junior pistol shooter several years ago that had a significant amount of training in smallbore rifle. While shooting AP, he fired a shot early in his training session that was very poor. At that point I stopped him and asked him what he was thinking. His answer was "I'm just thinking about shooting a 10 on the next shot."

I proceed to ask him how he expected to shoot a 10 on the next shot considering he had just executed such a bad shot. His answer was that he had been "coached to just think about shooting 10s and nothing else."

I then asked him if he knew what the definition of insanity was. He didn't know. When I explained to him that it was the act of repeating something over and over while expecting a different result, the light started to go on a bit.

I then explained to him that until his performance had improved to where he could shoot only high quality shots, he had to analyze the cause for any poor shot and then take steps to correct it on the very next shot.

Needless to say, this was a revelation for him.

Stan

IPshooter wrote:
Greg is exactly correct.

I was coaching a new junior pistol shooter several years ago that had a significant amount of training in smallbore rifle. While shooting AP, he fired a shot early in his training session that was very poor. At that point I stopped him and asked him what he was thinking. His answer was "I'm just thinking about shooting a 10 on the next shot."

I proceed to ask him how he expected to shoot a 10 on the next shot considering he had just executed such a bad shot. His answer was that he had been "coached to just think about shooting 10s and nothing else."

I then asked him if he knew what the definition of insanity was. He didn't know. When I explained to him that it was the act of repeating something over and over while expecting a different result, the light started to go on a bit.

I then explained to him that until his performance had improved to where he could shoot only high quality shots, he had to analyze the cause for any poor shot and then take steps to correct it on the very next shot.

Needless to say, this was a revelation for him.

Stan

^^ Can't tell if trolling or just stupid.

This is more an example of poor coaching than anything else.

Firstly, if a shooter is concerned only with shooting 10's, they are never going to get very far.

A shot in the centre of the card is the result of a correctly performed shot process.

Then, for you to come along and ask how can you expect to shoot a 10 on the next shot given such a poor shot previously, is worse coaching and does no favours for your shooter.

As a shooter I know when I've shot a poor shot, the last thing I need is some know it all coach who comes along and says "hey that was a pretty crappy shot, how do you think you're going to shoot better when you are s**t?"

The role of a coach is to assess what elements of the shooters technique can be improved upon and then explain that to the shooter in the most simple way possible, so as not to cause confusion.

If you really want to help your shooter give them the tools required to execute good technique.

As a coach, it is your role to find the mistake and correct it. All the shooter needs to do is focus on how to perform the shot process to the best of their ability every time they raise the pistol.

Good luck

Hey Guys,

Thanks for all the help, been good reading the reply's. I'm not one to dwell on bad shots i would just like to understand why its happening so i can understand what is happening during my shot process to cause this.

I shot the below pair of cards during a shoot last night, they are an average pair for me the misses can get worse or better, but i just want to pop them up to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. One of the shots i was convinced it was a good release but once i lowered the pistol it was a flyer. I was focused on my front sight and the trigger squeeze was nice and my follow through was in the right area, i did notice my grip pressure was a little different. I'll do some more dry firing during the week and work on this part.

Thanks for all the reply's i know you cant really come up with a fix with out seeing me shoot, i guess i was looking for possibility's of what it could be :)

Cheers,

Brenton

The card on the left is upside-down and the card on the right is sideways. Is that the way they were when you shot them? Are you certain? There's a reason for the numbers and other printing to be done so there's one side which faces up - consistency. It becomes difficult to look back at the targets later and use the results to help in diagnosing sighting errors or other problems if you can't tell which way was up while they were shot.

If you are certain that these were the way you show them, I'd suggest you need to work on consistency in your technique. About half of the results are good, half not so great. I have days like that, and other days when things just work out really well. Comes down to mental focus for me, more than anything else.

lastman wrote:A shot in the centre of the card is the result of a correctly performed shot process.

Er, no it isn't. A shot in the middle can easily be a poor shot that just happened to end up in the middle. You can only tell by knowing what the shooter did to acheive it.

The role of a coach is to assess what elements of the shooters technique can be improved upon and then explain that to the shooter in the most simple way possible, so as not to cause confusion.

If you really want to help your shooter give them the tools required to execute good technique.

As a coach, it is your role to find the mistake and correct it. All the shooter needs to do is focus on how to perform the shot process to the best of their ability every time they raise the pistol.

Good luck

I don't agree with that either. The role of a coach is to help the shooter identify what they did wrong and correct it. Now the coach quite probably will suggest the solutions to those problems, unless the shooter themselves knows.

I see one of my roles as a coach to try and make the shooter more self aware. Only they know what is going on in their mind for example and if they are in the wrong state of mind or not concentrating on the sights, then they need to recognise and correct that.

Rob.

I must ask:
Given Brenton's access to face-to-face coaching in Adelaide, why is he asking for 'correspondence' guesses on the web?

Brenton,

You have a number of good shots. One thing to work on is to focus VERY HARD on what you did when you shot those. That's what you want to be able to do every time, and if you just let them pass, you are wasting an opportunity to learn, not from your mistakes, but from your successes.

You should think about every facet that produced those shots. How did you approach the target? How long did you hold? How fast/slow was your trigger squeeze? What did the sight picture look like? You want to reinforce the entire experience of shooting a good shot so that you can recreate that process at will, and eventually, without even thinking about it.

Sometimes you can "get in a groove" and crank out one good shot after another. One thing that makes that possible is that you have a fresh example of what a good shot feels like & looks like. Ideally, the longer you shoot, the more easily you will be able to unconsciously recreate that level of performance, and for longer & longer strings of shots.

lastman wrote:

IPshooter wrote:^^ Can't tell if trolling or just stupid.

This is more an example of poor coaching than anything else.

Firstly, if a shooter is concerned only with shooting 10's, they are never going to get very far.

A shot in the centre of the card is the result of a correctly performed shot process.

Then, for you to come along and ask how can you expect to shoot a 10 on the next shot given such a poor shot previously, is worse coaching and does no favours for your shooter.

As a shooter I know when I've shot a poor shot, the last thing I need is some know it all coach who comes along and says "hey that was a pretty crappy shot, how do you think you're going to shoot better when you are s**t?"

The role of a coach is to assess what elements of the shooters technique can be improved upon and then explain that to the shooter in the most simple way possible, so as not to cause confusion.

If you really want to help your shooter give them the tools required to execute good technique.

As a coach, it is your role to find the mistake and correct it. All the shooter needs to do is focus on how to perform the shot process to the best of their ability every time they raise the pistol.

Good luck

Thanks, lastman. I appreciate offering advice and then you trashing me.

And as frequently happens, you missed my point. Do you honestly think that a rookie pistol shooter, who happens to throw a 10, can do so again just by thinking about shooting another 10? Until a sufficient level of proficiency has been attained, this is just impossible.

And for the record, my comment to the shooter was not demeaning in any way. I *did* find a mistake and try to correct it. He was ignoring the cause for a really bad shot and simply telling himself to shoot a 10 without putting any effort into fixing his technique. I call that a recipe for failure.

You also assume that we took no steps to correct his shot delivery technique. Hate to disappoint you, but that's not the case.

Stan

Stan, Don't get mad at Lastman, he is just a selfmade man who is worshiping his creator. -- Bill --