Sunday, October 19, 2008

Today's Range Report #4

Good day shooting today ... hot (around 30degC) and long - 6 stages around 120/130 rounds (didn't count) and I think our squad had 8 people in it. There were 4 squads today, so quite a lot of people shooting.

Again I experienced a few stovepipes - but I'm convinced these are caused by me not holding the gun firmly enough, because after I started to focus on holding the gun properly the stovepipes stopped. My friend was in the squad and he was really helpful in letting me know what I was doing right & wrong. He had a bit of a go at me for not actually grounding my feet properly when shooting, so I guess that's the next thing I need to work on.

I did okay - slow again, but pretty accurate. I was particularly pleased with one stage (16 targets, 32 rounds), of which 31 were in the "A" zone. The other was a "miss" and I did spot that I had missed it, but decided not to back it up (not sure WHY I made that decision).

There was a "freestyle", then "strong hand", then "weak hand" shoot again. I did really well with the "strong hand" section. Not so good with the "weak hand" bit (but did get the shots on the target) ... guess I need to practice that too.

So in summary, I didn't hit any no-shoots, I didn't get disqualified and I only had a couple of misses ... all in all a good day. All of the others in the squad were v.good shooters but they didn't seem to mind me slowing them down.

Things I Learnt Today:
1) Hold the gun FIRMLY
2) Ground my feet properly
3) When doing a "gun unloaded with mags on table" type shoot, focus on the gun rather than the targets to start with
4) Back up a missed shot unless it means that you need an extra reload
5) Take more water on hot days :)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Reminds me of when my son was young and I got a Glock 19. A Glock 19 with 17 rounds in the magazine is relatively heavy, hence not overly inclined to buck on the first shot. By the time you get to the last round, the weapon's pretty light, so the recoil is much more noticable. My son (seven or eight at the time, I'd guess) would do just great shooting the first 16 rounds, but he would invariably stovepipe the last round. It was a very interesting physics lesson.

Hank

Anonymous said...

Sounds like you are doing really well. And having a ball. I have to get myself to a range, it really does sound like fun!

Ride Fast said...

I don't think how you grip the gun has anything to do with stove pipes.

Try one less round in the mag to begin with and see if it's a tension problem. Or maybe just lubrication as the gun loosens up during shooting.

Julie said...

thanks "ride fast" i have experimented with non-full mags & stuff and they don't seem to make a difference ... if i focus on holding the gun correctly it works, if i get tired or focus on something else (like where my feet are) i tend to have the problems.