Practice duration and times

[Dev]

Okay now I must remove all doubt. I am not a pro shooter and want to be national level. Minimum to make it through the pre-national is 360/400. After this, the nationals are a 60 scoring shot ISSF match.
How much do guys with regular jobs practice? I dry fire at home , do figure of eight movements with the pistol and do some more pointing at the wall and dry firing (same session). Then the next day I run for twenty minutes or half an hour and do ab and light weight training. I try to do this( pistol work plus fitness) about four days(two for each) a week. Then I plan to go to the range one day and shoot some groups. I am just about beginning to shoot 85,89,90, 91.

Oh and in office I read about shooting (target talk Olympic pistol naturally :-)) and keep squeezing a wad of paper to improve my grip. What do you gentlemen think of my routine so far?

My friend tells me to practice twice a day but I don't know whether that will needlessly stress me out.

Warm wishes,

Dev

[Richard H]

The actual structure of your practices are probably more important than the amount. Yes you have to put in the time, but how that time is utilized is what will allow you to make gains. You need to be working on specific parts of the shooting process, you need to identify the areas that require work and develop ways to work on those aspects. Then you reevaluate and work on the the next weakest aspect. This is a continual process of evaluation, improvement and reevaluation.

A cursory look at what your doing looks like you have the time to put a good program together and it's great that you have included time for general fitness (many neglect that). If you could find a good coach you'd probably be much further ahead, and they should be able to tell you what you really need to be working on.

[Brecey]

My friend tells me to practice twice a day but I don't know whether that will needlessly stress me out.

Warm wishes,

Dev

The first thing to keep in mind is 1) hopefully you shoot for the enjoyment of it.

If you ever find that you have diverged from 1), then question what's going on. You should always be having fun.

I wouldn't say two training sessions a day are need at this time, even the most dedicated shooters usually have one day off a week, it's good to have some recovery time between intensive sessions.

Just remember the basics. Sights, trigger, follow through.

[Dev]

My friend tells me to practice twice a day but I don't know whether that will needlessly stress me out.

Warm wishes,

Dev

The first thing to keep in mind is 1) hopefully you shoot for the enjoyment of it.

If you ever find that you have diverged from 1), then question what's going on. You should always be having fun.

I wouldn't say two training sessions a day are need at this time, even the most dedicated shooters usually have one day off a week, it's good to have some recovery time between intensive sessions.

Just remember the basics. Sights, trigger, follow through.

Hi,

Thank you, I forgot that I like doing this. Just getting obsessed with scores at times. And the guilt of buying a very expensive ap.

Dev

[Guest]

Doing it right in the begining is much more important than the amount of time, so a coach would be a big help. Iv been shooting nearly 2 and a half years. the first year i probably did 45 mins 3 times a week since then I havent done any proper training and its got me to shooting 560 in competition. But now im finding the limits of how far you can go without training as im going down hill so now I will have to start to train properly

[Rover]

"And the guilt of buying a very expensive ap."

You ARE a sick pup! The expensive toy is one of the greatest pleasures!

I like a practice session (as opposed to a training session) to be as long as the actual match. It's kind of a stamina thing.

[luftskytter-]

I've recently made my dry-firing "work". This means being able to concentrate properly just like a real shot, including followthrough.
Doing about five of these by my bedside every morning and evening seems to help just as much as lots of shooting. I tend to find that full concentration during dry fire is a greater challenge than "real shooting", and working on this seems to help me a lot.

I also have to admit that my physical shape is not the best nowadays, but I've got good strength. This means I often shoot about 150 shots at training sessions without really thinking about as physically challenging.
Quite often the last 50 shots during a session willl be the best ones, the first 100 being a "warm up excercise". Working near your physical limit is a handicap, and avoiding this should be a goal.

I think it is interesting to see that five quality dry fire shots twice a day make a significant improvement in such a perspective.......

[Steve Swartz as Guest]

"surprising" indeed!

[Dev]

"And the guilt of buying a very expensive ap."

You ARE a sick pup! The expensive toy is one of the greatest pleasures!

I like a practice session (as opposed to a training session) to be as long as the actual match. It's kind of a stamina thing.

Hi Rover,

That is so true. :-). Will train more and have fun at it.


Dev

[Dev]

I've recently made my dry-firing "work". This means being able to concentrate properly just like a real shot, including followthrough.
Doing about five of these by my bedside every morning and evening seems to help just as much as lots of shooting. I tend to find that full concentration during dry fire is a greater challenge than "real shooting", and working on this seems to help me a lot.

I also have to admit that my physical shape is not the best nowadays, but I've got good strength. This means I often shoot about 150 shots at training sessions without really thinking about as physically challenging.
Quite often the last 50 shots during a session willl be the best ones, the first 100 being a "warm up excercise". Working near your physical limit is a handicap, and avoiding this should be a goal.

I think it is interesting to see that five quality dry fire shots twice a day make a significant improvement in such a perspective.......

Hi ,

I shot about a hundred pellets on Sunday and you are right the latter shots were better. My question to you is will we get into the last fifty type of zone during a match? Really stupid question? :-)

Dev

[RobStubbs]

<snip>
Quite often the last 50 shots during a session willl be the best ones, the first 100 being a "warm up excercise". Working near your physical limit is a handicap, and avoiding this should be a goal.

I think it is interesting to see that five quality dry fire shots twice a day make a significant improvement in such a perspective.......

Hi ,

I shot about a hundred pellets on Sunday and you are right the latter shots were better. My question to you is will we get into the last fifty type of zone during a match? Really stupid question? :-)

Dev

I would suggest that if your last 50 are your best then your training isn't quite right for some reason. Perhaps it's just in your head, when you relax enough, but you need to be in that zone as soon as possible into the match (in the sighters), to shoot your best.

Rob.

[Dev]

Hi Rob,

I was asking a theoretical question maybe just being weird. I normally manage to calm my match nerves within the sighters about ten or fifteen.

I have experienced the zone like feeling for maybe about twenty or so 9's and 10's get distracted at times. I am working on meditation and breathing for a longer mental fix.

Thank you for your advice,

Dev

[Spencer]

Hi Rob,

I was asking a theoretical question maybe just being weird. I normally manage to calm my match nerves within the sighters about ten or fifteen.

I have experienced the zone like feeling for maybe about twenty or so 9's and 10's get distracted at times. I am working on meditation and breathing for a longer mental fix.

Thank you for your advice,

Dev

there are meditation tapes/CDs available that may help: but DO NOT play them while driving, using machinery, etc.!!!

[Dev]

Hi Rob,


there are meditation tapes/CDs available that may help: but DO NOT play them while driving, using machinery, etc.!!!

Thank you Spencer I shall look them up and remember must not play while driving...must not play while driving...must not play while driving...

Warm Regards,

Dev

[luftskytter-]

Yes,
I've felt the need for many shots to get into "the zone" for a long time.
Used to be like that with archery too, before I started shooting AG.
In local competition I've strived to get 30 practice shots / "sighters" before scoring starts.

OTOH,
I believe my recent good experience with dry fire practice seems to have helped a lot. This means I'm getting better at getting into the "zone" fast. I shot 120 shots or thereabouts last night; after about 15-20 shots, I seemed to stabilize nicely. Today there's a minor competition, so we'll see.

I'm convinced that regular small amounts of dry firing at a target works wonders for me. One reason is that it actually takes more discipline to do this properly than with "real" shooting. Plus the regularity and very short sessions seems to be a good way of building the right habits. Plus it's easy to find time to do this.

[Guest]

Dev,
many excellent points to try have been made, I would like to add:

1. Your training time is valuable, if your not having a good session and cannot "re-enter" your match zone. STOP. do not continue bad habits. Go do some other daily task and come back and start over.

2. Try to do a training session after you have cooled down from a run. I have shot some very good groups after cooling off but still having "the running high". I actually used that mental state as my match relaxed state for quite a few matches. I seemed to have no match nerves and could quickly shoot to the ability of that days hold.

[Dev]

Hi Luft,

I'm sorry if I have abbreviated your name but it is quite a mouthful :-).
I will dry fire practice more. All the best for your match and please post how well you fared.

Regards,

Dev

[Dev]

Dev,
many excellent points to try have been made, I would like to add:

1. Your training time is valuable, if your not having a good session and cannot "re-enter" your match zone. STOP. do not continue bad habits. Go do some other daily task and come back and start over.

2. Try to do a training session after you have cooled down from a run. I have shot some very good groups after cooling off but still having "the running high". I actually used that mental state as my match relaxed state for quite a few matches. I seemed to have no match nerves and could quickly shoot to the ability of that days hold.

Hi,

Thank you for the excellent ideas. I did abandon my last session cause thirty shots went all over the place. I stopped shooting and analysed the problem and through this forum discovered the cause.
I really love the idea of using the time after a run for a session. Will try it this weekend and let you know how it went.

Warm Regards,

Dev

[luftskytter-]

Hi Luft,

I'm sorry if I have abbreviated your name but it is quite a mouthful :-).
I will dry fire practice more. All the best for your match and please post how well you fared.

Regards,

Dev

My "name" is just a nick meaning "air shooter" so no offence :-)

As one might expect, yesterdays match didn't go too well. Average I guess, but the physical work from the day before was still noticeable. Lesson learned before and repeated now: don't put in too much hard work just before a match. Happily this was a minor series thing where season's three best results count, and I was sort of expecting this and saw it as an experiment in how, when and how much to excercise. This time a couple of dozen warm-up shots didn't seem to make much difference, snd for some reason the trigger felt heavy.......

Other symptoms were mainly that I was vibrating/trembling more than normal. Handling this dominated quite a bit more than usual. Even "physical"/endurance sports use a rest period just before a major event as part of the tactics.

I also heard it mentioned that the Swedish air pistol "genius" Ragnar Skanåker claims long term dry firing practice is a major ingredient in his success. He recently won the Swedish national championships at an age of more than seventy, so I guess it works!

[Eurastus]

My "name" is just a nick meaning "air shooter" so no offence :-)

Säger du... luft gevär eller pistol?