The last BP2/DPS1 class I helped with at KR Training generated a bunch of thoughts in my head. I thought I’d make a small series out of it.

DVC

The motto of IPSC is abbreviated DVC, which stands for Diligentia, Vis, Celeritas, or accuracy, power and speed. All of these things are critical to successful shooting. We don’t need to discuss power here… the 9mm vs. .45 ACP debate can rage elsewhere. Let’s talk about accuracy and speed.

There are camps that say accuracy is most important. There are camps that say speed is most important. And then there’s the camps that say both are important. Me? I think both are important. It can be the most accurate shot, but if you can’t get it off in the time needed what good is it? It can be the fastest shot possible, but if it doesn’t hit what you wanted, what good is it? The fastest miss is still a miss, the bullseye that hit after it counts doesn’t matter.

That all said, accuracy and speed are opposing forces. The faster you go, the less accurate you’ll be. The more accurate you try to be, the slower you will go. So it’s about finding a balance.

But more important, it’s about finding YOUR balance.

A lot of people in the DPS1 class just blasted away at the targets. Yes they were fast, but they didn’t hit what needed to be hit. I’m sure if there was a shoot-off between Karl and these students, they could both shoot at the same speed but not at the same level of accuracy. You cannot judge by someone else’s standard. You have to find the rate at which YOU can accurately shoot and not shoot beyond that level. You want to go as fast as YOU can to get good hits. If that’s not fast enough for class well, realize again that we’re just going to put pressure upon you. If you are improving and doing better now than you did before, that’s all that really matters.

Qualifications

From time to time, push yourself beyond your limits. Get a shot timer. Shoot some courses. If you Google around you can find tons of different drills and qualification/standards courses. Some are simple tests, others work out specific skills. Whatever you pick, Karl told me a good way to run these courses. Run the course with no regard to time. That is, a string may say “3 shots in 5 seconds”. Well, just do 3 shots and ignore the time. What you want to do is run the course with no pressure, and clean the course: all A-zone hits, 100% score. What that does is shows you can run the course. If you can’t run the course, the course may be too advanced or there may just be areas that you need work before you run the course (e.g. weak-hand-only shooting for groups at 25 yards), so go address those things. But once you can run the course clean with no time pressures, now run the course again to establish your own par times. So now turn on the timer but don’t set par times… just a start signal and record your shot times. Again, run the course at the same speed you ran it clean, clean the course, and see how long it took you to run that string. Record it. This establishes YOUR par times. Now you can compare it to the established times, and that can give you some measure of where things lie but don’t stress over it too much. What is key is for you to progress. So let’s say you did those 3 shots in 7 seconds. Next time, work to do those 3 shots in 6.5 seconds: set up the timer with a 6.5 second par time and work to get all A-zone hits within time. If you can do that, bump the time down to 6.0 seconds, and so on. Just keep pushing yourself. If you get to 6.0 seconds and are making 1 A and 2 C hits, now it’s time to analyze and work on that level. And so on and so on.

Accuracy and speed are both important. I perhaps edge just slight on the side of accuracy (take that quarter of a second to find the sights… it’s faster than realizing you missed and having to take a second shot), but perhaps because it’s the very thing I’m working on myself right now (reminding myself to take that quarter of a second).

The last BP2/DPS1 class I helped with at KR Training generated a bunch of thoughts in my head. I thought I’d make a small series out of it.

Information Overload

When you take class, you’re going to have a lot of information thrown at you. Typical KR Training classes are a few hours long, thus some days there might be 2-3 classes in a single day. Some people will stay all day for all classes, and that’s certainly going to be information overload.

Can you remember it all?

I can’t.

One day on the range I noticed Leslie Buck pulled a little notepad and pencil out of his back pocket. He jotted some notes, then put it back into his pocket and stepped up to the line. What a good idea! I stole it from him. 🙂

When in the classroom it’s easy to take notes, especially if you’re given handouts. But when you’re out on the range? That’s also a place where you need to take notes and remember things. It may be a specific thing you were told, a specific skill being taught, maybe you want to remember how class flowed so you can run the same drills in your own practice. Maybe you remember something. Maybe you have an “ah-ha!” moment. There’s going to be so much flowing around in the day… chances are good you will NOT remember it all.

A little notepad and pencil in your pocket goes a long way.

The last BP2/DPS1 class I helped with at KR Training generated a bunch of thoughts in my head. I thought I’d make a small series out of it.

DAMNIT!!!!!

I do it too.

You’re trying to do something, you’re trying to do it right, and you blow it.

DAMNIT!

See this on the line a lot. Typically it takes the form of a facial wince, head slightly twisting to the side or slightly shaking in a “no” sort of way.

It’s normal and natural to do this. We’re in class. We take class because we acknowledge deficiency in ourselves and want to improve. When we aren’t seeing the progress we desire, we get upset. Totally natural. If you find yourself doing this, well…. you do. While some will say you ideally don’t want to ever engage this sort of negative behavior, that’s easier said than done. Let’s take a baby step in that direction.

If you find yourself getting mad at yourself for screwing up, allow yourself that moment to be mad about screwing up, and then — let it go.

If you don’t let it go, what happens is you focus upon it. You’re now saying in your head “don’t screw up… don’t screw up… don’t screw up again… don’t screw up….” And when you do that you must realize what you’re now doing is focusing on the notion of screwing up! You’re not focusing on the task that you should be doing (e.g. aligning the sights, good trigger press, putting the hole in the target where it needs to be). And so typically what happens? You screw up again, because all you had on your mind was screwing up.

So you mess up. Acknowledge it, file it away for later, chalk it up for learning, then let it go. Let the emotion of the screw-up go, and refocus back on doing what you should be doing. Mentally phrase it to yourself in terms of what you should do, e.g. “OK… align the sights… slow smooth trigger press….”.  Tell yourself what you SHOULD do. If you get it right, great. If you mess up again, quickly analyze what you did wrong, make correction, let the emotion go, and refocus and do it again.

Admittedly, some days just won’t be your day. That might then signal it’d be better to just call it a day and head home. Don’t let that bother you. There’s still something positive to be learned from the experience. Let the emotion go, learn what you can, focus on what you should do.

And you know what else helps?

Smile. 🙂

The last BP2/DPS1 class I helped with at KR Training generated a bunch of thoughts in my head. I thought I’d make a small series out of it.

Pressure

You have to learn to pace yourself…. Pressure
You’re just like everybody else…. Pressure
You’ve only had to run so far, so good.
But you will come to a place
Where the only thing you feel
Are loaded guns in your face
And you’ll have to deal with… Pressure!

Thank you, Billy Joel.

For many people who come to Defensive Pistol Skills 1, it’s the first time they’ve had to shoot under pressure.

You’ve got instructors hollering commands at you.

You’ve got all this new information you’re trying to process and apply.

We tell you to go faster.

We tell you not to be the last guy on the line to get the shot off.

You feel your own pressure because you want to do well.

You feel that people are going to judge you, be it the instructor or other students.

You can’t help but look at the targets of the other guys to see how they’re doing, and comparing it to your target.

There are so many things going on. And you have to deal with the pressure.

Shooting at the range? There’s rarely pressure there. It’s usually very casual, friendly, laid-back. Taking the CHL test? You’ll probably have some nerves since it’s a test and you want to pass. If you’re coming to Defensive Pistol Skills, you’re taking the first step towards a deeper understanding of “a gunfight”, not just slinging lead with friends at the range on a sunny day. Granted DPS1 isn’t truly a gunfight, but it’s helping to lay the foundation for the skills you’ll need.

And that includes the mental aspect, dealing with the pressure.

Do we as instructors expect you to have it down after 3 hours of class time? No. Do we expect you to try? Oh certainly. But it happens time and time again: you get in class, you get taught a new skill, we want you to apply it, but then we put the pressure on you and you revert to monkey-brain mode and do what you’ve always done. It’s natural. What we hope you take from it tho is a realization of where your skills are, what it is that you fall back upon when the pressure is on, and thus what you may need to do in your own out-of-class practice to help yourself get there. Basically, you need to reshape your monkey-brain response.

What do I find myself saying most often to folks in class? Relax. 🙂

There’s a lot of tension, which is understandable. But tension doesn’t help you. Grace under pressure is what you want, but I know from my own experience that’s far easier said than done. I too struggle with being too tense and having that do more harm than good to me. I know relaxation makes things go faster and better. But I’m human like you and struggle with it. Still, so long as we know it and work to improve it, that’s all we can do.

Just remember: when in class, it’s not a competition. It’s not a contest. It’s a time to learn. We don’t expect you to come to class knowing it (else why are you here?), we don’t expect you to perfect it in 3 hours. So long as it’s evident you’re getting the concepts, that you’re trying, that you’re learning, that’s what matters.

Then when you’re out of class, work to put that pressure on yourself. Get a timer (hey, if you have an iPhone, there’s lots of shot timer apps). Some people take the class with friends, so get together after class and work on those same skills and drills with each other. Consider taking up competition. Sure it’s artificial, but it still will push you.

Every so often, cracked.com has some good “lists o’ stuff”.

Today they’ve got a good one, exposing 5 ridiculous gun myths that only exist because of movies.

Good selection of myths, and good debunking of the Hollywood crap.

The last BP2/DPS1 class I helped with at KR Training generated a bunch of thoughts in my head. I thought I’d make a small series out of it.

Trigger Control

When it comes to elements of a good shooting platform, there’s talk of grip, stance, breathing, sight alignment, trigger control. Yes, all of these things can matter, but as Karl is fond of pointing out it’s really the last two that matter most.

Sights matter… maybe. I say that because how much sights matter can depend upon what you need to see in order to hit the target. For the beginner, it’s best to just say “line up the sights” and have them get everything square. But as you progress you’ll come to realize that it isn’t so cut and dry. For instance, needing to hit the side of a barn at 3 yards may not need much sight alignment at all. Trying to hit a 6″ plate at 25 yards is going to need fair lot more of a perfect sight picture. If you want to know more, check out Brian Enos’ book Practical Shooting, Beyond Fundamentals.

Trigger control is the other key part of the equation, and in the last class you could see a lot of issues with it.

What you need to do with trigger control is to move the trigger in a manner that does not alter your sight alignment before the bullet exits the barrel. Easier said than done. Trigger control certainly matters on long guns, but given their size/weight-ratio vs. how much force you exert on that trigger pull, it’s a lot harder to disturb the alignment of a long gun than a handgun. Then when you have a light handgun with a long heavy trigger pull, it just makes matters worse. Ever wonder why the top handgunners with their fancy open race guns use 1911-style guns with very light triggers? It’s all about doing what it takes to make that trigger press as minimal as possible so as to mechanically eliminate as much chance for disturbing the alignment as possible.

The way to start on trigger control is to move slowly. And slow means slow! When you press that trigger, slowly count to three. You want to get that “break” on 3 (or thereabouts… it’s not so vital, it’s just about ensuring you slow down and don’t rush it). All too often there is 1…… 2.3. Resist the urge to do that. Some call it the “surprise break”, that you know the gun is about to go off but you aren’t 100% sure of the exact microsecond in time when it will… just let it go. If you don’t, what happens? You flinch, you jerk the trigger, which moves the gun, and the hole in the target is in a place you weren’t aiming for.

One consideration to make. There was one gentleman in class that was constantly hitting to the left, even with improved trigger control. From what it looked like, he had too much finger on the trigger. He had large hands with thick fingers, so what happened was when his finger was on the trigger the top edge of his trigger finger was coming in contact with the gun’s frame and pushing it to the left. You may need to look for issues like that. Consider how much finger you are putting on the trigger. A good place to start is the middle of the pad of your index finger, then adjust from there: maybe closer to the tip of your finger, maybe closer to the distal joint.

Drills

There are a few drills useful for helping with sight alignment.

In dry fire, you know there won’t be any sort of loud bang. So, in all of your dry fire practice, watch your front sight and strive for it to move as little as possible during that trigger press. One exaggeration is to use the Wall Drill, where you dry fire with your muzzle perhaps an inch away from a white wall (i.e. any surface that gives high and clear contrast between your sights and the background). When you dry fire in the Wall Drill, any movement of your front sight will be sorely evident. Strive to keep things smooth.

Remember: slow is smooth, smooth is fast.

In live fire, the good old Ball & Dummy drill is great. You need to buy some dummy rounds (snap caps, etc.). Mix some dummy rounds into your magazine. If you have a partner, have them load your magazine. If it’s just you, I found putting a little tray of live ammo mixed with dummy rounds on the bench in front of me, then I just avoid looking at things while I reload the magazine (hey, if you peek you’re only cheating yourself). Load the gun, then shoot. When you hit those dummy rounds, if you’re slapping the trigger it will be sorely evident as you watch that front sight get pushed down.

If you are using a revolver, ball & dummy is pretty easy to do. Load the cylinder full. Fire one round. Without looking too much at what’s going on, open the cylinder, spin it, close it. Fire. Repeat until all shots have been fired. You can even vary it slightly. For instance, shoot once, spin cylinder. Shoot twice. Spin cylinder. Shoot twice. Spin. And so on, until all shots have been fired. This can apply for semi-autos as well, in that it doesn’t always have to be single shots… sometimes a string of multiple shots is good because you might get that first shot perfect but it’s the follow-up that you blow.

Another suggestion for live fire is to shoot groups. Set up a paper plate at 25 yards (or even 15 if that’s as far as you can go). Shoot slow fire groups (i.e. maybe one shot per 5 seconds or so? this is not a time exercise). Shoot at least 5-10 rounds into that group before stopping. Take your time, strive to make the group as small as possible. Many suggest to do this drill as the first thing you do in live fire practice AND the last thing you do.

I’m no guru with trigger control. I myself need work. I use these drills myself to work on my trigger control.