Saturday Practice & Linda's Progress

Saturday Practice & Linda's Progress

Friday night we had dinner at Jameson's Charhouse to celebrate Emil's 70th Birthday, and I think a good time was had by all. Kozy was going up to Alpha the next morning to get some practice in, and he suggested that Emil, Linda and I all go up there with him, and he would do some coaching and practicing. First of all, I'll say how much I appreciate that he did that. Kozy is working hard to earn his GM card, and when he takes three entry level shooters up to practice, he loses a session of practice of his own, and ends up teaching his dad, Linda, and I. It's a sacrifice, and I eat up the coaching, anything helps.

We started working the same classifier that we ran on Wednesday night, and I started off with a nice run, 4.98 down 4 points (had steel issues), with a 2.17 turn and draw. We cycled thru a few times, and my biggest issue is still the turn and draw, I'd been working at 1.9 in practice, but the long shot to the small steel is not easy. I felt better about my ability to get hits when I just slowed down a hair and focused on the center of the target, not just when I saw cardboard. 

Linda started off around 5.62, and then got down to a 5.32, with a 1.84 turn and draw. Kozy hit the nail on the head, and told her that it won't be long before she is beating me, she's quick. We focused on her hands on her grip, and came to the conclusion that there is nothing wrong with her gun, the double feeds are just a result of her riding the slide of the gun. It's good to know the gun is fine, and her riding the slide is something she can fix, it's a dry fire and practice issue. The other part where it showed was her inconsistent hits, she was dragging across a target, and making some of the same mistakes I was making a few months ago. She's really showing major progress though, she shoots less, practices less, and is where I was just a few months ago? Good for her.

Go Linda!

After practice, Linda and I took Lauren to a Birthday party, and then ran up to On Target so Linda could try a couple of things. So here's the deal with her. When we started, (and how naive does this sound?) we thought we would get just one gun, and we could share it to shoot matches! I don't know if that was innocence, or me just trying to get the foot in the door to the sport. It was obvious quite early she needed to get something of her own, and she ended up with a Walther P99. She picked it because it was there, and last February guns were hard to find, and we could keep some cost down simply by being able to share magazines. She actually controlled that gun really well, but it was not the most “friendly” trigger for her to learn on. Terry and Les shot her straight, and told her to “get rid of it”. She borrowed a Glock 17 this summer, and liked it, and I had a “free” gun coming from winning a raffle at the IL State IDPA Match. She got a lot of well intentioned advice that she should skip that, and get a Glock 34 instead. So, without shooting one, she agreed, and I went thru a process to get that “free”. She shot it for a match, and, well there were a few issues there. With the money from selling the P99, I had bought, and got some work done on a Springfield XDM 5.25” Competition model, and I shot it in one match, and gave her the option of taking it. I had intended on eventually replacing the Walther with it at some time in the future, but since the work was already done, why not?

When we started shooting, Linda had rented an XDM, but a 4.5”, and really liked the gun, so she more or less “assumed” the XDM from me.  So come to today, and the truth is, she’s never had something that she really picked, something that was what she wanted. When she did try to pick the Glock 17, she got “overruled” by all of us who wanted to help get her something really built for competition. Being completely honest, she could have earned her A card, hell, gone beyond that with any of the guns I mentioned, what’s stopping her is her own self-confidence, and faith to put the pedal to the floor and really go. That’s something that Terry said, that I happen to agree with. It’s not offensive in the least, I was in that spot myself this summer, I was afraid to get up and go, I was so conscious of being “safe” that I was afraid to run, to shoot fast, all that stuff. Her gun is not holding her back, she is holding herself back.

The best wisdom is for her to HTFU and keep her gun, and get better with it, I know it, she knows it, but I also understand her wanting to try a few things, and for once pick and own something that she really wants. Way back when, I wanted to try a steel gun, but since we were “sharing” (that’s laughable isn’t it now?) and she hated it, I had to give up on the idea. So, she’s been hearing me sing the praises of the CZ, so the idea of going to On Target was for her to try a few stock CZ’s, and compare them with her gun. She started with a stock 75B, and was not very impressed. It’s heavier than the XDM, and lighter than my gun, and she rode the slide, and did not feel that much better than her gun. At this point she was a little disappointed.

CZ 75B

She took out her XDM, and put 15 rounds thru it, and had some okay groups, and some that went high and left. She was trying to focus on not riding the slide, and on keeping her front sight in place.

While she did that, I exchanged the 75B for a stock SP-01 (my gun, but with a firing pin block, and no custom work.) She put 30 rounds thru it, and she really liked it. She had no problem keeping the hits in the “A” zone, and she was able to do it fairly rapidly. She was not a fan of the long double action pull, but she was amazed how the gun handled recoil, and how easy it was for her to keep her eye on the sight and shoot rapidly.

CZ SP-01

Then I had her take her XDM out again, and try to repeat what she accomplished with the SP-01. Same issue, it was harder to shoot quickly, and her hits were inconsistent.

Springfield XDM

Finally I gave her my custom CZ SP-01 Shadow, and let her put 30 rounds downrange with it. Her 2 double action pulls led to bad shots, but her grouping was outstanding. She totally understood what I mean that the gun makes you look better than you are, it’s easy to shoot, forget the other stuff, and just focus in on that front sight.

CZ Shadow

There is a local shop that has an SP-01 at a very reasonable price, but to get it, she’d have to sell her XDM, and she’d want work done on that SP-01. It would be an excellent gun, not as good as the Shadow, but reasonably close for several hundred dollars less than what I paid.  (Hey, worst case, it ends up a back-up gun for me, and we all know that's coming soon anyhow.) She’s got some choices to make, changing guns can be an excuse or a cop out for lack of success, especially since her gun now is more than capable of being a GM caliber gun. The reason I see an exception, is simply that she’s never gotten anything that she really wanted, or picked on her own, and that’s wrong too. She should have gotten what she wanted, so she could own her progress. Get an SP-01 and work on it? Get on the list and order her own Shadow? Stick with the XDM, grind it out, and get better before making a change? I’m not sure what she’ll do, but those are three legitimate possibilities, and I’ll support whichever choice she makes. 100% up to her. Does she just say "this is it" with any of them? We'll see. 

In 2013, USPSA saw it's first ever female Grand Master shooter, Jessie Duff:

Jessie Duff

IPSC also had it's first ever woman match winner of a level 4 match, the Far East Asia Championships, Maria Gushchina

I know sometimes people think that shooting and USPSA are for the guys, but the truth is there are women out there who can shoot, it's good to see them achieve some notoriety in the sport. I'm not saying that Linda will shoot with 'em, but who knows, maybe she will. At the very least, and sooner than she thinks, she'll be beating me on a regular basis.

I'm pretty proud of her, and I hope she sticks with the work, and can accomplish her own goals.

Practice Progress

Practice Progress

I skipped my MISS match on Wednesday night, my ankle is not hurting anymore, but it is definitely tender, and while I can shoot, I felt uncomfortable trying to shift my weight, and I definitely was not up to running and cutting. That's two missed matches, and a total of 5 classifiers that I could have shot the past few days, and I missed. I could say that missing them hurts me, but if I had shot poorly, and I likely would have with the ankle tweak, that would have been worse. Thankfully, there is a MISS match for the first time ever on a weekend, this coming Sunday, and both Linda and I will get a chance to get out there and shoot it. If it was not going on, I probably would have tried to push myself and go Wednesday.

Go Shoot Here!

On Tuesday, Linda and I hit the range (nice being on vacation together, with Lauren in school!) and we got some drills done and shot for a couple of hours. I got my turn and and draw El Presidente going, and she did some low ready to a target, and some groups. She had some pretty nice groups with her XDM, her struggle was with her first shot, it was typically very low, but once she got past that, and was working the reset, it looked very good. She also got in a hundred rounds or so with the .22 just groups on steel plates, and it was good experience for her.

El Pres

I ended up with one pretty baller El Pres run, and I have no trouble beating the 8.45 second time that I need to get my 60% classifier. When everything went right, I was in the mid 6 second's, solid hits, 1.65ish draw, and a 1.70 second reload. All hits were on the paper, and I had a run with plenty of alpha's, that said, there was plenty of inconsistency on both the draw and the reload with times as high as 7.40 total, with a 2.11 draw, and a 2.63 reload. I was a little frustrated, but I walked out feeling that I simply need more repetitions right now to improve both draw and reload.





By Thursday night, I've got my draw to first shot on a target in front, to the right and left in the 1.50 to 1.60 range, and I'm getting the sight picture I want about 90% of the time. I had been struggling with how often I got the picture, and the time, when I again realized that I was so tense that I had a tendency to go straight out, and then my arms would drop a little bit bouncing low. When I'm relaxed, I did not have that issue at all, and I am smooth. It's funny, I always thought I was more relaxed, and odd that I have to remind myself, but truthfully being relaxed is a key to bringing out my best performance.

The XDM 5.25"

My hand sit's below the grip

The other part of my practice, the reload has been an ongoing struggle this week. I have been having an issue hitting a 1.70 second par time, and Les wants me at 1.50 seconds. This was extremely frustrating because I could not seem to break past 1.70, much less 1.50. Tonight though, I did two things, and got self 1, and self 2 together a little bit, and started to see a few 1.5 and 1.6 reloads. What I did, was a rehash of what Les did at our last class, I looked at my reload for the different components. I'm content with how quick I drop my mag, but I realized that my support hand had no urgency going for a mag, and I pushed myself to get that indexed into my hand as quick as I could. That alone made me feel that I was going faster. The biggest struggle still remains getting the mag into the gun. In the picture, you can see that my  hand is bigger than the grip, and unless I get the mag in, I have a tendency to either get my other hand, or pinch it between the mag I am inserting and the magwell. I picked up Linda's XDM, and with the bigger grip, that is not an issue. Mind you, this is not a gun issue, it's a practice thing, where I need to make sure that I'm getting the mag in, and if that means looking it in, I need to do it. I'm also getting my elbow slightly lower, and it's a more comfortable place to get the gun and reload. Objectively, the other thing I know I was doing, was admonishing myself as I was reloading, and trying to tel self 2 what all the steps were, and that was causing me to lose focus. With the few little changes, I was able to not tell myself what to do, I just started doing. My times went down, and now that I've felt where I need to be, I think I'll be able to repeat that tomorrow.



Practice, practice, and more practice! I figured I'd have my draw down to 1.3 seconds in short order, but it's taking me a little more time than I thought, same thing with the reload. Don't get me wrong, I'm not upset with my progress, part of me just thought I could pick things up and instantly I'd be there. I know that is not actually the case, and these are skills that are earned. There really is no substitute for multiple repetitions, and to get some solid coaching. Now that I'm finding what feels right, and works for me, I think some of the road blocks are out the way, and the path is clear for me to improve in practice.

You Do See Some Different Stuff

God I love this sport!