Me

Changing again

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

Summer of last year I stopped my Kuk Sool practice.

It’s become evident to me based upon the past few months that my current “traditional” martial arts study is also going to go on the shelf for a bit.

My current study is under Ray Parra. Ray teaches Kali, Silat, Jeet Kune Do, Thai Boxing. It’s basically Ray’s blend of things and it works quite well. The study of it? Great. Ray’s a great guy, good teacher, good school, good curriculum. I like how they actually roll, hit, spar, throw down, and so on. The philosophy is very much in line with my own. It’s a friendly and useful environment. I really like how everything is done there. My backing away has nothing to do with Ray or anything like that.

Man, this sounds like trying to break-up with a bad girlfriend:

“It’s not you, it’s me.” 🙂

But that is the truth. Nothing about this decision has anything to do with Ray or what he teaches, his school, or anything of the sort.

It is me and what’s going on in my world.

On the one hand, I’m feeling spread too thin. Too many things going on in my life, and I just cannot give them all the attention they need. I’ve got some new endeavors, things with my kids, current pressures at work, all sorts of little things that add up. When the day is still only 24 hours long well, only so much you can cram in. Something has to give.

I don’t want to give up martial arts, because it’s something I enjoy. So I am not giving it up entirely, just the formalities. Fact is, if I can’t make it to class on a regular basis due to whatever reason, then I’m just fooling myself and wasting my money. So that’s what I’m removing. I will still practice on my own. I will still keep up skills as I can. Later this year Leslie Buck will be holding seminars on edged weapon defense; arrest & control / baton tactics; and weapon retention, disarming, and improvised weapons; it’s my plan to attend these seminars. I know I will also continue to have on-and-off private sessions with Kuk Sool instructors. So my empty hand work will not go away entirely, it just won’t be a focus.

What am I going to focus on?

Handgun.

Continue to take instruction. To dry practice every day and get to the range as often as I can (once a week would be ideal, but schedules aren’t always conducive to that). To shoot more competition (haven’t shot lately due to schedule conflicts). I want to really excel in this area, and to do that requires focus and dedication.

So martial arts aren’t leaving my life, just another evolution… just another step along the journey.

Gunsite and Rangemaster standards

/ hsoi / 7 Comments

Did a little shooting today. No strict practice. I wanted to run a couple standards against a timer and see how I do.

The Courses

Gunsite 250

It’s been hard to find a clear description of the Gunsite 250 standard. For instance, what target? I figure from a holster, but open carry or concealment? Is there a particular scoring, or just you “hit in the right spots” else it’s a miss? So I just filled in the blanks for myself and this will be “my standard”, if you will. Even if this winds up not being exactly like the Gunsite standard, well, this is the course I shot.

I shot at a home-make IPSC target. I get lots of cardboard from UPS deliveries or Costco or wherever, so on pieces big enough I keep them and trace out my own IPSC target at the official size. It’s cheap, and works with that “reuse” portion of recycling, and then I can still recycle it when I’m done. 🙂  I shot my Springfield XD-9 Service from an IWB holster, drawing from concealment (t-shirt, pulling it upwards). No race, no gaming, like I carry.

From what I can tell, the standard looks like this:

  1. 3 yards – 1 head shot in 1.5 seconds
  2. 7 yards – 2 rounds to the body in 2.0 seconds
  3. 10 yards – 2 rounds to the body in 2.0 seconds
  4. 15 yards – 2 rounds to the body, standing to kneeling, in 3.5 seconds
  5. 25 yards – 2 rounds to the body, standing to prone, in 7.0 seconds

I couldn’t get to 25 yards nor go prone, so #5 was shot standing to kneeling at 20 yards.

My times:

  1. 1.72 seconds
  2. 2.3 seconds
  3. 2.39 seconds
  4. 3.39 seconds
  5. 4.63 seconds

Not bad, but not great. I also didn’t get 100% A-Zone hits. On the whole you can see I’m running just a couple tenths of a second slow. I’ll analyze in a moment.

Rangemaster Level 5 Handgun Qualification Course

This is the way I found the test. While the description only said “fired on an RM-Q2 target”, given the nature of the Rangemaster classes I’m going to assume this course of fire also assumes things like a concealment draw, carry guns (i.e. not race guns), and so on. I shot this using the same equipment and setup as above, including using an IPSC target instead of the RM-Q2.

  1. 3 yards – draw and fire three rounds in 2.5 seconds
  2. 5 yards – draw and fire 5 rounds with dominant hand only, in 5.0 seconds
  3. 5 yards – from low ready, fire 5 rounds with the non-dominant hand only, in 5.0 seconds
  4. 5 yards – draw and fire 3 to the chest and 2 to the head in 5.0 seconds (the write-up I found didn’t say “dominant hand only”, but I shot it that way because the next string did explicitly say “non-dominant hand only”, thus I figured this string must be dominant hand only).
  5. 5 yards – from low ready, fire 3 to the chest and 2 to the head with the non-dominant hand only in 5.0 seconds
  6. 7 yards – draw and fire 5 rounds in 5 seconds
  7. 7 yards – start at ready, fire 3 rounds, reload, fire 2 more rounds, in 8.0 seconds
  8. 10 yards – start at ready with a stovepipe malfunction in place. Clear the malfunction and fire 2 rounds in 5.0 seconds
  9. 10 yards – start at ready with a dummy round at top round in the magazine. Fire 2 rounds in 5.0 seconds (my assumption here was a live round in the chamber, so bang, click, tap-rack, bang).
  10. 15 yards – draw and fire 3 rounds in 5.0 seconds
  11. 25 yards – draw and fire 4 rounds in 8.0 seconds

Supposedly the total possible score is 250 with a 200 to pass. Trouble is, I can’t figure that out. If my math is correct, only 44 rounds are fired, and assuming 5 points for each proper hit, how do you get to 250?

Updated: Here’s the proper course.

Nevertheless, I had only 3 non-A-zone hits: 2 were in string #5, the 2 to the head with the weak hand (they were just below the A-Zone), and then one Charlie. My times:

  1. 2.16
  2. 4.110
  3. 4.05
  4. 4.41
  5. 4.23
  6. 3.30
  7. 4.60
  8. 3.37
  9. 4.04
  10. 3.71
  11. 6.28

Seems acceptable, but more analysis in a bit.

Bill Drill

I didn’t plan on doing a Bill Drill but I figured why not and ran it. Target at 7 yards, from concealment, same equipment and setup as the above. I did 3.03 seconds.

Analysis

I’m no Rob Leatham, but I’m happy to see I’m improving.

I shot this cold. Just set up the targets and off I went. I only let off 2 shots prior to starting so I could ensure the shot timer was working (more on that in a bit), and then those weren’t even trying… just for the noise. The Gunsite 250 wasn’t that good, but it all came down to a simple thing: I need to get faster and more efficient. I need to get simply faster. The primary place for this is my draw; concealment draw is just slow but I know I can get quicker with even more practice. Speed can come in other ways like just getting my brain to shorten the reaction time between when my eyes see the “good enough” sight picture for the distance I’m shooting at, my brain processes that, then brain tells trigger finger to move. That’s just going to take more live fire to get there. The efficiency part comes with compounding movement, like getting on the trigger sooner.

The thing is, I didn’t go into shooting this with any particular mindset… just shoot. What I saw is some improvement areas from long ago are becoming natural. What I also saw was the recent improvement areas are not yet natural. This goes back to what I’m working on now, which is getting the finger on the trigger sooner and working to just generally speed up. Dry fire can help me with the draw speeds and getting on the trigger. I will need live fire to help improve my eyes and brain processing.

I am happy with how I shot. I had a couple true “WTF” moments, especially with the malfunction drills, and my body just moved… no thinking, just doing. I am also really happy with my 15 and 25 (well probably 20) yard performance; it’s just applying fundamentals of trigger control and sight picture, and not going too fast. But I know I can do better. Accuracy is good enough, so for now I’ll work more on speed: getting on the trigger sooner, improving draw from concealment times, and so on. Yes more dry fire is in store, but I also need more live fire practice than I’ve been getting.

To me, the key for today was to continue to establish hard data points for myself, and to shoot some courses of fire I haven’t shot before. Practice practice practice, then shoot them again. Work to beat the par times and shoot them 100% clean. Quantified performance is useful.

Updated: for later reference, how to improve split times.

Other Tidbits

Snake Loads

Some time ago foo.c gave me a bunch of old .38 ammo, and included in them were about 8 .38 Special shotshells. Check out what The Box O’Truth has to say about them. I’ve been curious to try them out. I don’t think they’re good for anything except as snake-loads. Given the place I was at today is known for having venomous snakes about, I not only had my snake gaiters on but figured to load my snub revolver with these loads.

Before packing up, I shot two of them to see how they would perform. Both shots were on cardboard out of my snub revolver, one at 3 yards and one at 5. They shot fine, but the pattern is very wide. I would say, at least out of this snub, that 5 yards is kinda pushing the limit for a pattern that hopes to hit a snake on the ground… 3 yards is perhaps even a bit much, but that pattern did seem to be “hand sized” (my hand, spread out). Not horrible. Certainly I plan on carrying these things in my snub when I go into the field… I see no reason not to.

SureFire Shot Timer

SureFire made a free shot timer for the iPhone. I tried it once before but it failed miserably where a real shot timer succeeded. My guess? We were shooting under a tin roof and all that echo created too much noise. Probably could fiddle with adjustments to get it just right, but meh… didn’t bother at the time.

Today I was out in the open country: nothing above me but blue sky. Furthermore, there was no one else around, no other shooters, no other sources of noise. So I figured this would be a good “ideal situation” to try out the timer again.

I fired one shot, it didn’t pick up, adjusted the sensitivity to 100% and it picked it up, so I left it there. I used that timer in all of my work today. Just set it to beep for a random start, then I’d shoot. It recorded all the shots and split times just fine. Even caught some slide racking a couple times. I’m pleased.

One thing I noticed was the difficulty in finding the start button. I’d find the button, press, search the screen with the sun glare to ensure it started, then I’d get ready to shoot. While I was shooting I found this annoying because it rushed me. There were more than a few times I would finish verifying it was running (and of course that meant maybe a second went by), look at the target and then immediately heard the beep… I wasn’t ready! It was a little irritating. But looking back on it now, I’m glad it did that because it added a dimension of pressure and stress to me… it took away my ability to have a 100% clear head that was 100% “game focused”. I didn’t have time to start the timer, then clear my head and settle in ready for the buzzer. No, I had to get right to shooting. I’m glad it happened, and I’m glad it annoyed me, because it gave me what I needed: pressure.

Anyway, I’m happy with the timer, especially given it was a free app. For now I’m going to continue using it instead of buying a dedicated timer. It’s “good enough” for my needs. I’m sure eventually a dedicated timer will be purchased, but meantime there’s other things that need my financial attention. 🙂

Daughter

Daughter came with me for all of today (setting up the game camera, filling the feeder, shooting… she would tell me the course of fire and record my times). It was good to spend time with her. 🙂

Catching up

/ hsoi

Feeling better. Probably about 90% today. Whatever virus we had seems to be gone and we’re all almost fully mended.

Catching up on things, including blog reading. A lot of “mark all as read” is going on. Oh well.

Did I miss anything exciting?

Still down

/ hsoi / 2 Comments

I’m better, but still hating it. Still a slight fever, a pretty good headache, some intestinal cramping. Fun, eh?

I have been watching Outdoor Channel’s Wednesday Night at the Range.

Yeah, I gave SWAT Magazine TV another try but my complaint remains the same. It talks about providing instruction and it’s just not there. Tonight’s episode was featuring sniper shooting, but there was really no instruction of that… check that, there was about a minute of instruction at the very end of the show. Otherwise the show was just a lot of “here’s someone shooting”, plugging a product, plugging the magazine, or people talking. Don’t get me wrong, entertainment is fine, but if the show is to be about instruction then instruct.

By contrast, an hour later was Sighting In, the episode about care and feeding of your AR. It started right off with an instructional segment on how to clean the AR. It showed how to field strip, how to clean, how to reassemble. This was actual instruction. Then the Pro Tips had Sgt. Johnson actually telling how to sight in, e.g. shooting 3 inches high at 100 yards to be zeroed at 300 yards.  This was actual instruction.

Compare and contrast.

Mr. Pincus, this is what I said before and I’m saying again. I gave the show another chance, but the content remained the same. For what it is, it’s not horrible. I mean, it’s entertainment, sure. But if there’s actual instruction, please tell me just what segments were true instruction. In that episode, apart from the 1 minute at the end where you are taught how to bring the rifle off sling and into position, what other true instruction was there? The GunVault segment was informative, but was advertising; doesn’t count.

Anyway, the Advil is starting to wear off. Need to go back and lie down. Besides, Invader Zim is on. Never watched it when it was originally broadcast, but man… it’s fun.

Now it’s my turn

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

Youngest appears to be over it.

Daughter appears to be almost over it.

Oldest is still unscathed, as far as we can tell.

Wife is on the mend.

And now it’s my turn to go down for the count. Headache growing all morning. Presently have a 100.7Âş fever. I’m sure all the other fun stuff is only a matter of hours away.

I’ll be back whenever I get back… or bored of lying in bed. 🙂

Meantime, how about that SCOTUS today?

And… we’re down again

/ hsoi

Just when I thought I’d be getting back in the swing…. 2 are down.

Youngest was ill with something last week but seems to be over it now. Around 3 AM his morning Daughter wakes me up.

“Daddy?”

“Huh… Yes?”

“Tummy….”

and proceeds to throw up on the side of my bed.

Joy.

And now Wife seems to have it.

Oldest and I remain on the hitlist….

Thankfully it just seems to be annoying for a few days, worst at the onset then once you throw up you’re on the road to recovery.

I can’t wait for my turn! 🙂

AAR – Snub Training with Claude Werner

/ hsoi / 10 Comments

February 27-28, 2010 weekend, KR Training hosted a guest instructor. Claude Werner, one of the top snub revolver guys in the nation (IDPA Master-level shooter, 5 years as the chief instructor at the Rogers Shooting School, and someone that’s carried a snub for about 30 years), came and taught two classes specifically on the snub revolver.  This is my After Action Report (AAR) on the two days of snub-specific training.

Continue reading →

Your sobering thought for today

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

Driving home tonight from a long day and a long weekend of training. Before I left another student that left about 20 minutes prior phoned back to say there was some big accident at the intersection of US 290 and TX-21. There’s no other way to get home than go through there so I prepared myself for a delay.

When I came upon that intersection it was shut down completely with police directing me onto US 290 West to go back to Austin. Within moments of getting onto 290 I see more lights in the distance. Eventually all traffic comes to a complete stand-still. And we sit. I don’t know the full story, but it appears there were 2 vehicular incidents (don’t know about the first, but this second was certainly a collision). They were significant incidents.

While sitting I saw one ambulance leave. A little while later, that same one returned. Another ambulance left. That’s not a good sign.

Finally after about an hour traffic started moving. Cars crawled through the area of the collision.

It was horrible.

It was violent.

You could see the skid marks all over the road. The ground is soft so you could see all the earth torn up as the truck and the other car skidded off the highway. The truck was smashed up pretty good. The other car (maybe a Honda Pilot?) was on its side, destroyed. Based upon what I saw, the only way my brain could process what happened was that it was an extremely violent event. It was just terrible.

The perspective I kept? Sure, this inconveniences me, but there are other lives truly affected tonight. I mean… maybe I got home an hour late, but at least I got to go home.

The fragility of life.

And this after spending two days in a firearms training course, which ended with a good presentation and discussion about the sober realities of gunfights. But before you take this as something bad or depressing, really it’s just a matter of perspective. At least for me, the one that experienced all of this and is making some sort of feeble attempt to convey it all to whomever reads this.

I don’t carry a gun because I want to hurt or harm people. I carry a gun because I wish to preserve life: mine, my loved ones. You see how fragile, how frail we are. How finite life is. How in an instant it can be taken from us or at least changed drastically and forever. In the end, how do you choose to live your life? If you wish to live a long and healthy one… plan and act accordingly.

It doesn’t stop things from happening, but being reminded of your mortality now and again is healthy — it helps you keep life in perspective. As Jason Becker said:

We live thinking we will never die. We die thinking we have never lived. Cut it out.

This doesn’t mean I live in fear of dying. While I don’t look forward to the event, I know that death is the only true guarantee in life; it’s only a question of when and how. Rather, it’s about ensuring you live a good and full life. Are you going to look back on your life and wish you spent more time at the office or more time with your kids? Why do you eat healthful food? because you want to be around to spend more time with your kids. Why do you exercise? so you can be around to spend more time with your kids. So, same with the gun, that is someone opted to try to take me away from them or them away from me, I will do all in my power to ensure my kids and I can continue to spend more time together.

I strive to live a full and healthy life. One just has to keep everything in perspective. This weekend provided a reminder and reinforcement of that. Some of that came in an unexpected way.

An unwanted guest in my home

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

Wife leaves the house last night to go do something. Just myself and the kids at home.

About 30 minutes after Wife left, I hear a muffled crash.. as if some plastic had hit the floor. Huh? That’s strange. Quick cat check and I know where they all are so it wasn’t them.

I get up to investigate.

Check the backyard in case some of the plastic lawn chairs had been blown over. No, that wasn’t it. Come to think of it, it sounded like it came from the garage.

Uh oh. But if it was a person, why didn’t I hear any noise with the garage door? Hrm.

I go to check.

Slowly open the door expecting the unexpected….

And unexpected it was.

“Hi, Sneeze.”

Big sigh of relief, then big sigh of annoyance… at myself.

Who is Sneeze? You know all those muscovy ducks that hang out at our house? Sneeze (named by the kids) is one of them. He’s like Norm from the TV show “Cheers”. My guess is as soon as Wife pulled the car out of the garage he waddled right in and got trapped. The crash? Muscovy’s are perching ducks and from the bottles on the floor it seems he failed at perching on one of the shelves.

This is ultimately my fault. The ducks have developed a Pavlovian response to the sound of the garage door going up. Many times before we go somewhere the kids will raise the garage door then go put down some seed for the ducks. So garage door sound is now associated with getting fed. The duck could be 5-6 houses down but hears our garage and it’s a quick flight over for food. At the time the ducks would never come into the garage. I don’t know why, but they seemed unsure and afraid of it. Then one day they were all standing at the open door waiting for me, Sneeze saw me with food in hand and slowly he braved into the great urban cave. I rewarded him with food. And now, he’s no longer scared of the garage. It’s just another food plot to him.

*sigh*

I did this to myself. 🙂