Commenter 'Tim' mentioned that you should bring lots of ammo to the training class.

Well of course.  If they say the class runs through 500 rounds, total, in the 4 days it goes on, I'd have at least 600 rounds with me.  And probably a dozen magazine pre-loaded that I wouldn't count toward my personal total.

Though I question the value of high round count training classes.  Personally.  I just don't have the stamina for all that.  I think once fatigued out, unless you are training specifically for fatigue and how it affects your shooting, you aren't getting the learning bang for the buck.  And you might be reinforcing bad habits.

But a class that mentions a high round count does mean something positive.  Sounds like more time at the range and less time in the classroom.  Which is a good selling point for lots of shooting courses.  Unless you are learning first aid, or various law work wrt firearms and self-defense.

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I see myself showing up with a pair of duplicate 1911s and the instructor going "uh oh, another of these guys.  what a pain." But I'd also have my shooting log and my gunsmith toting bag with spare springs and parts.  Then my only problem keeping up with the Glock guys will be the mag sizes.  I am confident that my 1911s work well enough I wouldn't be 'that guy' with them.  A Glock would break first. 

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The tip of my extractor broke off?  I can fix that.  The replacement will have adequate tension set, but not be rock solid fit to the firing pin stop.  I've hear of the slide stop breaking.  Can replace that.  It too will be looser, but functioning.  

But it's a class, no time for testing.  That's why:  twin gun.  

You can replace a lot of broken pins and springs without too much worry or need for live fire tests.  

Ooo, I saw 10 things and didn't click over just yet.  I wanted to see how many I could guess.

Lessee.  A good attitude and a willingness to learn.

A spare gun.  Breakages happen and like to happen during gun class.

Lots of mags, preloaded, and a mag loader so make reloading those mags as easy as possible.  Ammo for same, of course.

A hat.  To protect from the sun and shade your eyes.  

A good appropriate holster and a GOOD belt.

Drinking water.

That's six.  Lessee how I did...

The article had more clothing recommendations.  Like footwear.  Expanded on the belt.  And ear and eye pro and a range bag.

I need to make devilled eggs.  Too hot to bake bread.

I am suffering from the 'good enoughs'.  I need more, different, training and to fight that attitude.

Obviously, he was biased on 1911s.  To knock the 1911 off it's perch as the best pistol platform in existence, the replacement would have to much superior to crack through his bias.  I believe he'd come around it one had, but that's an exceedingly high bar to clear, that never was cleared.

Putting aside the .45ACP part of the argument.

After caliber, he stressed the 'better trigger' on the 1911.  And sure, if you have trained on the 1911 and know the trigger, those can be really good triggers.  A thing of beauty for well done ones.  Nothing like a crisp SA.  Setting aside the change that a DA/SA trigger does when going from first to second...  Were triggers really so hugely bad in the 80s and 90s?

Because now?  They seem fine.  Not gritty or heavy.

Ok, ok, I remember the initial M&P triggers when those first came out.  2.0 are better.  1.0 wasn't HORRID.

"You need the extensive training in those crappy triggers to be any good with em.  Not like with the 1911, T-Bolt."

Wait a minute.  I don't think Jeff Cooper would recommend I throttle back training in any event.  He'd want my to train long with a good-trigger 1911.  With that much training on a striker fired 'bad-trigger' Glock I'd be pretty good with it, too.  And saved $2000 in start-up equipment.

And it's not like Cooper eschewed revolvers as long as he thought you had a stout enough cartridge in your cylinder.  He trained folks on those at Gunsite (cops often had no choice of pistol).  And a Model 19 might have a glorious single action trigger, but you train it with the DA.  A revolver trigger might not crunch, but would be on the heavy side in DA, unless you get ridiculous with the springs.  Cooper dealt with that trigger.  Why box the shooting world into a 1911, until something 'better' came along?

That said, I think I want to take the 1911 to the range next trip.  Plastic 9's are fine.  But so is my 1911.


---

[I've never fired a Bren Ten but would not be surprised in the least if someone reported it's trigger was AWEFUL.]

Any of youse ever try out the Mantis trainers?

I've seen this gizmo before, but now it is popping up more prominently.  Online reviews are pretty positive but I was wondering if folks I 'know' through here have played with it.



Or have you tried any other types of apps on your phone for dry fire tuning?

I'm looking for some social distance toys to play with that are on topic.

THIS could turn my world upside down.

"It’s NOT your Trigger Control"

I just made a quantum leap in personal shooting performance proficiency by relaxing and doing my trigger right, finally.  Will this rabbit hole upset that apple cart and get me better by doing... well not the opposite, but...

Look at me.  Now I am excited about learning again.

"So you are telling me that while you are gripping the handgun with nine fingers (and your palms if you have built your grip correctly), that the little ole trigger finger is overpowering the other fingers in the hand and pulling the gun offline?"

Well, no.  Sorta?  It's only 10% of it?  You should see what I do with the rest of everything when I screw up my trigger control.

Oh, you get into that in the very next sentence.  I should shut up and read, and think... Ooo, and bookmarking.  Looks like the class move around the country... good.  I need to scratch an itch.

"if you are gripping the gun hard and increasing the pressure in the controlling fingers while you pull the trigger, you will be moving the gun. Switch that to gripping and THEN pulling (while maintaining the pressure) and you will fix your issue."

OK!  I will try that.  A single concrete item to test on myself.  Good good.

Mostly bad.

I remember thinking, "This is awful, it might look better if I was shooting a silhouette target."  Further reflection... No, it's just regular awful.

I felt flinchy.  Like low grade anxiety.  Not conducive to good performance.

It's amazing how much mood affects performance.  And you gotta think on that, because if you ever NEED to shoot a gun your mood is probably going to be awful.  Fear.  Natural hesitance to hurt another human, even if that human is trying to kill you.  Adrenalin dump.  It'll be the worst day of your life, even if everything comes out alright for you results wise.

How?  I dunno.  Concentrate on your trigger finger?  Be maniacally angry instead of afraid?  Rely on your training and muscle memory to muddle through?  Maybe.  I am asking.  What do?

Anyway, I shot the first magazine at that low middle target at 75 feet.  The rest are at 25 feet.  47 rounds of American Eagle, no malfs, 967 since I built the gun.


Bottom left is last magazine.  Usually my last is my worst as I fatigue, but it looks like I was settling a little better. 

Why didn't anyone tell me that close quarter training could be like this?



That doesn't look so hard. It would make me a Force to be Reckoned-With from 0 - 50 yards. Instead of 6 - 50, like now.

Sometime when I sit down and start typing a blog post things just come to me.

SHOT show is going on.  Neat stuff, but I am at that stage in my gunnie journey that getting another boomstick only rarely become an itch. I'm glad the new stuff is there, but I don't have to bring it home.

I am more into DOING things with the guns I have.  Pistols I have.  A carbine class may be fun, and the class super informative, but at my age, doing the calisthenics might be too far of a stretch.  And close quarter grappling with a gun in play?  I'm at a distinct disadvantage.  15 years ago I'd be much more eager to try it. 

We live in a golden age of gun training but it still takes considerable effort to FIND a class, then put the time in to get to it.  On this I need to do better.

There are a few instructors I would not hesitate to make the effort.  But there is a lotta chaff out there, too.  And except for the handful I know there is no way to tell which is which.  There is no directory with columns of Recommended, and It's OK, neither good nor bad, and Not Recommended for the crap.  And there can't be.  Such a list would descend into internet-comments quality in a second.  An honest comment section would be too subjective. 

Here is a for instance.  Everything I have heard about Kelly's emergency medicine shindig puts it in the Recommended colunm.  I wanna take that class.  It just hasn't happened yet.  Not exactly a gun class, but related.  I've never heard anyone that took that class say they hated it or it was just OK.  But you know those people are out there.

Same with Mas's class.  The MAG classes.  I've heard good things about Mas's training skills.  Which class tho?  Do the 20 Live Fire, then try to do the 40 later?  Either way, I'd have to get a hotel room and take a week off work.  Harrisburg PA and Rochester Indiana are the closest, for instance, for the MAG40.  MAG20 is in Connecticut, so, can't get there through New York so easy.  The other classes aren't in driving range.  

See?  We may be in the golden age of training but doing one of the better classes isn't like popping in to the gun store 5 miles away and getting a new gun.  It's challenging. 

When under pressure I slap the crap out of the trigger.  Jerk City, USA, population:  Me.

And there is the rub, isn't it?  Slap less and less and make the trigger go good more and more under all circumstances, whether moving about or in great pain or wanting to just win, and you have snatched the pebble from the Kung Fu master's hand.  You can now leave the monastary.

Now, how to fix me?

Well, I am fixing me, it's just a slow plod.  Step forward, step back kind of progress.

Now flinching because I have, or am about to have, a tiny explosion go off in the pound of metal in my hand is one thing.  Jerking the trigger because I am trying to put my go-fast pants on and got both legs in the same hole is another.  You fix the first one by distracting yourself and getting out of your own way.  At least that is working for me right now.  You fix the second by trying to smooth yourself out.  Slow is smooth and smooth is fast and all that.

"Nuh uh!  Fast is fast!"

True.  But I think you gotta work out the smooth first before you can go faster.  And everyone seems to be in a hurry to go faster sooner.

I have a habit I need to break.

When drawing from the holster I meet the gun with the support hand way too early.  There is a risk the support hand could pass in front of the muzzle.  Also, it makes my presentation a bit jerky doing it the way I do. 

Plus, you know, slow.  When relaxed and smooth I can sit just under 2 seconds.  When jerky and flustered I am at 2.5. 

I am no J. B. Books.  I don't expect to get to half a second.  Ever.  My current goal is to get it under one and a half relatively consistently. 

How?  Initially, untimed 'dry fire'.  Just to smooth me out. 

8 years ago I would have said I "use a modified weaver stance."  But all my training was from DVD and books, for the most part. 

For example, I learned the thumbs forward grip from Todd Jarrett  when he did the Blackwater Para Blog Shoot-a-rama.  August 2008, I think? 

But youtube videos are no substitute for in-person training sessions.  Still, that helped.  Better than a VHS tape from the 80s. 

And this applies to more than just shooting or gunsmithing or related ephemera.

This applies to brewing beer, making a chest of drawers, wrangling 1's and 0's for a system administration job, driving a car, flying a plane, writing a book...

Everybody screws up.   Pobody's nerfect.

With some things, you screw up a lot.  Them 1's and 0's are hard to nail down and are unforgiving.  Believe me. 

When you get halfway good at something is when you start noticing and fixing the screwups before someone else notices and tells you to fix your screwups.  You are even better when you are fixing screwups on the fly, as you go.  Even BETTER is when you fix screwups and develop work efficiencies in the process that makes it seem like you went FASTER on a task than if you did it perfect and conventionally.

I've been screwing up at work a bunch, but catching myself and fixing it fast.  To my relief.  My boss has high standards but he also recognizes that people make mistakes.  He's never mad when he comes across someone fixing something, even if they mess it up.

Same with shooting.  One of the satisfactions of training is the training I have gotten to do self-adjustments as I go when I start missing.  Fix myself.  

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Do I need to mention that training is a LOT of fun?  I've said that before.  I have been lucky to find a relatively close decent trainer.  But now I am more likely to travel further to get more training.  The only thing bad about training, for some, is you have to put your ego in check.  Same with shooting competitions.  You probably aren't as good as that shooter you think you are in your head.  If you don't get wrapped around the axle on that you can have a lot of fun learning AND getting better.

(Well, I didn't have to put MY ego in check.  I knew I was rubbish going in. )

Try some, training.  It's good.  If it's not good the first time find someone else. 

I was taught a new trick in sim training.

Let's say you are presented with a spree shooter.  And you shoot his pixels and put him down.  Now you want to look behind you, check your six, as you are pretty sure bad guy is down down, but you never know.

You want to look around, but you also want to be able to engage the bad guy if it turns out he has some fight in him.

How do?

One way is to draw the gun back into the Sul position and scan around you.  Here is a cop doing that.






And that's fine.  You can get your gun back up on target pretty quick that way.  It's a good idea if there are still good guys milling about or the bad guy has a sneak partner.

Or... and here is the trick, you can keep holding your pistol on the target strong hand only, bring your support hand into your chest, and look over your shoulder on the support hand side.

Ok, that's not the trick.

When you turn back to look at the target your gun isn't pointing where you were aiming before the head turn.  It will be if you push the gun OUT...  Extend your elbow...  As you look back.  Then when you face forward and bring your hands together on the pistol grip the gun draws back into your regular position, and... shazam!  It's pointing pretty much at the same place.  Same POA

When told, I thought there was NO way that would work.  But it do. 

Trigger pull.  Sometimes when my shooting goes off the rails and I get flinchy I have to trick myself.  Distract myself.  To get a better trigger pull.  This helps.  But I'd rather not need it.

I'd rather regularly shoot well week after week.  But it's a constant struggle to get better.  It's not like tying your shoes well.  So far.  Where once you are good at it you don't have to think about it.

Distraction methods.

• Make the gun wobble.  Random figure eights all over the place. 
• Pin the trigger back and catch the reset, either after the gun settles (meh) or during the recoil.  I'd love to one day be able to dispense with this one.
• Some folks sing a song.  Girl from Ipanema.  In your head or out loud.  
• My favorite is telling myself "F it!  Just SHOOT it, you been here before."

Is this a cheat, a crutch?  Oh, yes.  What's it doing?  Causing the surprise break.  But it's not ideal.  You have to change methods as you get used to the latest.  I'd rather just have the trigger come naturally.

And it probably won't.  Not ever.  I don't have that talent.   I will pursue it, yes.  I may be able to quickly correct a trigger pull on the fly.  But never will I be perfect.

"If I am right handed and have a bit of a flinch because a small explosion is going off in my hands when I shoot, where do the shots land, T-Bolt?"

Low and left.

"Where do the shot land if I am slapping the trigger?"

Low and left.

"My shots land low and left, how do I know which it is?"

Well are you screwing up your face and eyes when the shot breaks?  Flinch.  Are you yanking the trigger too hard and making the shot go off NOW?   Slap.  Maybe you are doing both.

"I can't wait til I am like you and no longer have a flinch or slap the trigger and shoot good"

OH, NO!  Who told you I don't do that? ALL the time.  With practice you get used to the explosion and you flinch less but you still flinch.  I still do.  Same with slapping, especially when under stress by trying to go faster.  It's a constant struggle.

I was really pleased with this.


Sure, I aimed high to compensate for the sights.  And that high one was a flyer.  But look at the group!  I was happy to do that with .22 a couple years back.

And this after not training, or practicing, for almost a month.

What was the secret?  Relaxing.  I didn't dwell on the shots.  My attitude was "I know what a sight picture is, I know how to make the trigger go good.  Just do that."

Obviously, I am not perfect.  In a string of targets I have a bad habit of moving to the next target before I taking care of the business at hand with the first target.  And in a hurry I still slap the heck out of the trigger.  I need to concentrate on resets, then fast resets, then 'move beyond the reset...' like more advanced shooters do.  But that's a process.  Get the resets first.  Worry about the next step after.

The minutiae I think about now compared to 5 years ago.  And once mastered the minutiae turns into background noise...  This part of the process fascinates me.

Hatfield's has a metal finishing class coming.  And I have a scratched up stainless project that could use some help.

Good.

Hey, if you want to learn in class how to install sights on a 1911, and can get to Manassas VA for a few Saturdays, or want to learn metal finishing or how to fit a new 1911 barrel and bushing...  Give him a call, tell him I sent ya.

This is the first target I type I ever shot at.


But many are in the same style.  We are trained by targets and whatnot to aim for center mass.  And good enough for what it is.  Hit a bad guy there, that's much better than missing him.

But this is the hit zone.


I figure Patton won't mind.  He was all blood and guts, enthusiastic about martial training, and he has been dead 75 years and he is a manequin here.

Now, you've ruined his day, but is that the best shot placement to end the fight, a hit to the liver like that?

Guess where I hit in the simulator with video of people moving, under stress, trying to get a shot off before the baddie in the video turns that pump shotgun toward ME after offing his hostages?  Yup, the belly.  Automatically.  Because I have been trained with those paper targets.

Ok, the first shot hits the video person in the belly, then the person drops so my next shot misses, over, and the next shot hits the pelvic girdle of the video person on the ground.

Though sometimes the first shot of mine hits the hand or wrist the weapon is held in.  You fixate on the weapon and that is where the first shot goes.  Also sub-optimal.  Or super optimal if you are really lucky, but I don't want to count on luck.

Ideally, and what I am working on, is to try to retrain myself to hit a little higher, up nearer the ribbons on the General.  And do that instinctively instead of belly holes.  To shift where I assume the bullseye is, mentally.  To get that marginally better stopping-shot up in the center of the chest area instead of the center of gravity.

"But a baddie can take one in the pump and still fight back, T-Bolt."

True.  But he is less likely to want or be able to continue a fight with a shot there.

"What about body armor?"

The sim throws in that, too.  Three good shots with no result and I pretty automatically switch to the face right now.   If I could always hit a target in the eye, quick and on the move and accurate, we wouldn't be discussing this now, tho, would we?   

"A simulator?  No live ammo?  That's not training.  There is no recoil control, it's a totally different experience than live fire.  Might as well be playing a video game."

Yes, there are disadvantages to a simulator heavy training regime.  But you overlook the distinct advantages.

Ammunition costs are zero. 

It's an actual Glock we use in there.  The trigger is the same as real Glock because it is a real Glock. 

It's much easier to see the tiny barrel movements just before trigger break if those movements aren't interrupted by the violent recoil of a shot.

And, maybe most importantly, anyone in the room can HEAR your trigger pull.  Something you'd never hear in a live fire situation.  And it isn't hard to hear every damn flaw in my stupid trigger work, dangit.  Especially when it falls apart under time pressure. 

So, it is training.  Not perfect, but an excellent adjunct to the real thing.  And I am glad I do it. 

Spent this last session hitting simulated targets on the 100 yard line.  The 'plate' is the size of the front dot.