If you want to reap the harvest, you will have to work the land. It comes from disciplined effort on a regular basis.
Understanding Speed
Shooting fast is a combination of two factors, economy of motion and flawless execution. That’s it… The idea of moving the body fast is the first thing people think of and the reason they struggle. It doesn’t matter what you did that one time on the range, it matters what you can do on a regular basis. The connection between those two factors is consistency. You cannot have on and off again economy of motion nor can you have a sometimes flawless execution. You have to have both of them at a reasonable level and sustainable. The part most people don’t like to hear about is sustainment over time. You might be able to pull off those blazing speeds, but how much effort do you put into maintaining this level of performance.
Trim the Fat
When it comes to economy of motion many people misinterpret this for just going fast. It is not, it is about using the minimalist amount of movement to accomplish the task. Don’t move any more than you should. When you do move, move as accurately as possible. If you present the handgun to target and your sights are not aligned because you moved so fast, have you really accomplished anything. When I am working with students one of the easiest ways to improve their performance is to get rid of all the crap. All the superfluous movement not needed. Everything from leaning, hunching, drooping and everything in between.
Fewer Mistakes
At some point you need to learn what is acceptable for the shot required; which is based off time and distance. This concept will break ground of flawless execution. When you are pushing the boundaries the difference will mostly be who makes the fewest mistakes. In this case, you have to execute your technique that has been synthesized to the bare minimum with the fewest mistakes. I’m talking about out of a 100 presentations you are hitting 80% or better to the standard you set forth for yourself. In many cases the key at this level will be adjusting your speed. I tell students over and over do not shoot faster than you can guarantee the shot. How do we get there is all hard work.
Crawl, Walk and Run for Real
In our classes when we introduce a subject, whatever it is, it starts out with dry fire practice. The progression is to work at a speed you can think your way through the technique. Since many techniques are based around several micro tasks performed in a logic sequence it can be overwhelming for many students. To help process this adhering to the law of primacy we introduce the various training speeds. We use three, slow, half and full speed. Slow speed is where you put in the hard work. It is painfully slow, but it allows the student to execute the technique flawlessly. Half speed is where you see your hard work start to pay off. As speed increases you should see your hit ratio remain the same at this point. If it does it reinforces the hard work from slow speed. At full speed we pressure test our technique. If you put the hard work from the beginning you should see an 80% hit ratio on your baselines at full speed. When you follow this process the major take away is your consistent. It is impressive for sure.
After you have achieved this level it really boils down to slicing hairs. The problem with the industry is most folks want to start out here; it is not a gear issue; it is a training issue. Always will be…
