Practicing Right…
Those “Demotivator” posters crack me up to no end. Oddly enough, they can still provide great guidelines to live by (oftentimes more so than the real “Motivational” posters). One of my favorites from a while back said “When you earnestly believe you can compensate for a lack of skill by doubling your efforts, there’s no end to what you can’t do.” Harsh? A bit. They do have a point, however. The typical response to “how do I become a better shooter” is the same as the old “how do I get to Carnegie Hall?” joke.
The answer: Practice.
Oh is that it? All I have to do is practice and then I can be the next Jerry Miculek or Rob Leatham or Julie Golob? Well heck, lemme get some ammo and start!
I hate to be the bearer of bad news but there’s more to it than that. If I spent 8 hours a day for the next 2 months learning how to shoot a gun while holding it upside down and pulling the trigger with my toes, I will become good at that specific act and that’s it. What good will that do me? I’m not going to tell the home invader with the machete and hockey mask “hold on a sec, I have to take my shoes off so I can work this gun”.
If you spend all your time practicing the wrong thing, you’re going to learn the wrong thing. It’s a very logical statement but it’s missed by so many.
So what can you do to make sure you’re practicing the right thing? That’s the easy part. First off, you want to focus on the fundamentals:
- Stance
- Grip
- Sight Picture
- Trigger Pull
Make sure each of them is consistent and the same. Start with your stance. Make sure your feet and arms are in the right places. Make sure you’re balanced correctly. Make sure you’re bending correctly at the waist. Then check your grip. Are you squeezing the handle with the correct force? Are your thumbs where they’re supposed to be? You’re not holding the gun in gangster style of the Hollywood cup, right?
Move on to your sight picture. Make sure the front sight is the one in focus. Make sure it’s placement on the target is correct. Also, at the point, remember safety rule #3: Be sure of your target as well as what’s behind it. Just because you’re at a shooting range doesn’t mean you can relax on any of the rules.
With everything else correct, focus on your trigger pull. Keep it nice and consistent. Don’t jerk the trigger. Keep that front site level and just squeeze until the gun goes off. Make sure it’s the same pull every time.
“But Noob”, you might say, “You’re preaching to the choir here. We know how to shoot a gun. BLAM BLAM BLAM See? All on paper.”
You’re right. You got them all on paper. Heck, in a self defense scenario, every one of those shots probably would have taken down an attacker. In competition, they would have gotten you a good score. Does that mean there isn’t room for improvement?
As my father always says “It’s only what you learn after you know everything that counts.” Unless you’re putting all 15+ rounds in the magazine through the same hole on the dead center of the target in less than 5 seconds, you’ve got room for improvement. Is that achievable? Probably not. Just because it’s not probable, however, doesn’t mean it’s not possible. Is it a realistic goal? That’s up to you to decide.
Let’s talk about goals for a moment. Whenever you go to the range, you want to have a goal in mind. What do you want to focus on? What would have to happen for you to consider it a successful day of practice? Now, sometimes you just want to go and put holes in paper for no other reason than to have fun and relax some. That’s perfectly fine. We call it “Group Therapy”. If you’re working to improve your skills, ask yourself why? Are you wanting to someday try competing? Do you want to make sure you’re skills are sharp so that you can better protect your home? Do you want to be a better hunter? Having long term goals in mind will help you to figure out what those range day goals should be.
So, for example, if you’re wanting to compete you’ll want to work on skills like drawing, speed and consistency. For defense, try out some techniques that will simulate how your body will be reacting during the inevitable defensive adrenaline rush.
I also like to split my goals into two categories: “Realistic” and “Would Be Nice If”. When defining a goal, it would sound something like this: I would like to ultimately compete but it would be nice if I got good enough that Rob Leatham was asking me for advice. To me, having something loftier in mind than a “good enough” gives you a better range reward your success. Would I ever reach the “would be nice if” I gave in the example? Realistically, probably not. By striving towards that, however, I would naturally and ultimately surpass that simple “good enough” goal.
Also, challenge yourself. I’m borrowing a line commonly used by the guys at Magpul but it’s a great guideline: “Amateurs practice until they get it right. Professionals practice until they get it wrong.” What they’re saying is that pro’s will push themselves until they fail. At that point, they will work to push through that failure and then train until they find their next point of weakness. It’s a wash, rinse, repeat type of training scenario that ultimately produces better skill. Knowing your limits is one thing. Working to surpass those limits is an entirely different thing.
So once you’re able to get a superb group at 7 yards, move it back until your grouping sucks then work towards getting good groups again. If you keep doing that over and over, at some point you’ll be making 85 yard pistol shots like Hickok45.
Another important thing is don’t be afraid to slow down a bit. I’ve watched people walk up to the firing line with a thousand rounds of ammo and blow through it in just a few minutes. They seem to want to just pull that trigger as quickly as possible. In looking at their targets, their shots are all over the place. I’m not even sure every shot landed on the paper at all. What are they really learning there? That’s right! They’re learning how to pull a trigger quickly and accuracy be damned. Frankly, it’s a bit of a dangerous way to shoot, don’t you think?
I think that every woman reading this article will back me up here: just because you can do something fast doesn’t mean you’re doing it right. There will always be time to speed up later. Focus on the fundamentals first. My rule of thumb is when going super slow gets to be too easy, speed it up a bit. Once you hit fast and accurate and close range, move the target back and start over. Always be challenging yourself, but don’t do it too early. Keep it slow and steady and you’ll win the race every time.
Finally, my last bit of advice is to remember that it’s only a competition when you’re competing. Pay no attention to how the people around you at the range are doing. Keep an eye on them for safety reasons, mind you, but beyond that don’t worry about how you’re doing compared to them. To answer your question, yes I do have an anecdote to illustrate my point here.
I was at a range and there were 3 or 4 other people there besides me. We all had our targets within 10 yards and were doing pretty good. In walked a guy who, after setting up, immediately sent his target all the way back to the 25 yard line and started blasting away. To his credit, he was freaking good. He was firing fast and was keeping impressive groups. I noticed a couple of the other people started to speed up their shots shortly after this guy showed up. Then they started putting their targets farther back. The problem was that they weren’t ready for it. They started missing their shots left and right. Now, I’m not going to sit here and say that their egos got the best of them and couldn’t take that someone was shooting better than them. At the same time, if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and shoots like a duck…
Look, here’s the thing: someone is always going to shoot better than you. It’s a fact of life. Even if someone is at the absolute pinnacle perfection, they will only be there temporarily because at some point, someone is going to make it their life’s goal to be better than that person. I’ve always referred to Julie Golob as a machine. She’s an amazing shooter and has so many titles to her that it would be impossible to say them in one breath. What do you want to bet, however, that there’s a young girl at a range somewhere practicing with the sole goal in mind of beating Julie in competition some day? I’d say it’s a safe bet. You can’t, however, let the fact that someone is doing better than you negatively affect your training.
So pay attention to your practice and your practice alone. Don’t worry what Rambo in the next lane over is doing and don’t worry about what Nooby McJustStarted on the other side of you is doing either. Work on your goals and technique.
If you make sure your practices count and you practice often, your skill will improve. It’s a fact. Keep on it, don’t get frustrated and try to constantly challenge yourself. If you make the most of your training, I think you’ll be surprised to see just how quickly you i grow as a shooter.
Images used under Creative Commons License from MrBill and Anuj Biyani.
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