What makes a person a good shot?

[Tote 9]

Hitting your target consistently, regardless the situation. Thats a good shot IMHO.

I am not yet a "good" shot. Not like I want to be.

And yea, 500 rounds in two years is not much. I've only owned my .45ACP for 3 months but already have over 700 rounds through it.

I shot 50 rounds through my 9m just before I took my chl cource 2 years
ago. For most of that time I was one of those car carriers only. In the last
few months I have taken my CHL seriously and am now carrying everywhere
it is legal. So now I wii be practicing much, much, much, more.

[jimlongley]

Go to your nearest range. Go ahead and pay and get checked in. Make sure you have your weapon where you normally carry it wearing what you normally wear.

Have a target hung at 5 yards.

Run around the building twice. Go straight to the range, face in an odd direction from your target. Draw and fire 3 rounds as fast as you can while moving away from your target.

Observe your holes. Test over.

The guy I took the level 3 security officer training from made us do exactly that, and then he flashed the lights on and off while we were shooting.

Of course, having a laser grip on my gun, I was undaunted by the flashing lights and scored well.

The next time I shot he made me take all head shots - I still passed.

[Tote 9]

I belive it's "trigger pull". Even in point shooting, or especially, trigger pull is the thing that can keep you on or off the target.

There are a few that are beginning to teach that it is the foundation, even before the "front sight" mantra. Because it doesn't matter how hard one works on "front sight" if they are about to yank the gun around pulling the trigger.

Your right about the trigger pull. My first pistol was a 9mm. with a long
trigger pull. About 2 weeks ago I shot a Kimber 45 and it took a while
to get use to a 4 lb. pull. By the way I bought that Kimber after putting
100 rounds through it.

[Skiprr]

Ah, Tote 45.

Another 1911 convert!

[longtooth]

You want to change your screen name yet.

[Tote 9]

You want to change your screen name yet.

I'm thinking about it.

[KBCraig]

Learn to shoot at beer bottles and cans and golf balls is another good one golf balls is where I'm at right now, line up like 30 balls on the ground or on whatever and shoot them off then you can also shoot them as they roll about on the ground after each shot, it makes for some lively shooting.

There are always lots of shotgun hulls laying around when I go to the range. They make for great plinking.

Not long after I remarried, I took my then-15 year old stepson to the range with me. We shot a few rifles, and I let him get his first ever pistol practice, with a Ruger Standard Auto. After he had the basics down, I set up some 12-ga. hulls at 7-10 yards. He would hit a few and miss a few, but he did just fine for a total beginner.

Then I set up four hulls, loaded 8 in the magazine, and double-tapped them all: shoot the base, then shoot it out of the air. It's not that hard, it's all a matter of timing.

Now, if only I was really as good as he left the range thinking I was!

Kevin

[Popshot]

Go to your nearest range. Go ahead and pay and get checked in. Make sure you have your weapon where you normally carry it wearing what you normally wear.

Have a target hung at 5 yards.

Run around the building twice. Go straight to the range, face in an odd direction from your target. Draw and fire 3 rounds as fast as you can while moving away from your target.

Observe your holes. Test over.

txinvestigator,

That is a great idea! I have a great visual of the local range with a bunch of guys running around the parking lot.
Looks like I'll be packing some Gatorade.

[kanders]

For learning to shoot, I vote for sight picture as the first thing to concentrate on. My wife was having trouble even hitting the paper at 7 yards, until I told her to concentrate on sight picture and not worry about where exactly she was aiming. Immediate improvement! If your sight picture is just a little off, you can miss by a mile. Now we just have to work on trigger control.

[The Marshal]

Go to your nearest range. Go ahead and pay and get checked in. Make sure you have your weapon where you normally carry it wearing what you normally wear.

Have a target hung at 5 yards.

Run around the building twice. Go straight to the range, face in an odd direction from your target. Draw and fire 3 rounds as fast as you can while moving away from your target.

Observe your holes. Test over.

Good advice.
My buddy Sung in Maryland does some funny things.
He goes and puts on gloves, heavy clothing, runs in the parkinglot, does pushups, etc.
He commented that a lot of people pointed and laughed at him.

He shoots 2 hands, strong, weak, reloads off hand, uses foot to cycle slide, etc.

He said he wants to train in *all* conditions.

Tell ya what, I would trust Sung to make the shot, if it ever came to that!
Oh and Sung *wants* to move to Texas too.



~Bill

[Pickpocket]

txinvestigator -

Good advice - I've always been a fan of jacking the old heart-rate up and then trying to shoot. That takes care of the heart-thumping, out-of-breath, shaking hands aspect - the physical stress.

On the other hand, one thing I don't find too many people doing is trying to induce mental stress during a practice session. This is just as - if not more - valuable than being able to cope with physical stress...the difficulty is trying to figure out how to make it mentally tough.

I personally use a few CoF's that are all about mental stress, but they're focused on teamwork, not so much the individual shooter. Paul Castle (C.A.R. System) has an outstanding teamwork drill that is simply one of the best that I've experienced for forcing people to deal with mental stress...but like I said, mostly focused on teams.

Anyone have an opinion on this?

[bburgi]

I'd be interested to hear about mental stress training as well- for the physical, unless I'm sighting in I will always run to get my targets on a 100yd (or even 200yd) range. It get's my heart rate up just enough that I have to control it while shooting... great hunting practice.

[Witness P]

hey, it took me 2 months to make it to golf balls, shoot .22 it's the cheapest and for the amount of shooting and learning that you can do there is nothing better

[Tote 9]

Thanks, Guys for all the tuttoring and advice. Hope I can remember most of
it. Right now I'm thinking it boils down to this.

1. Mind controll, be prepaired for any given situation.

2. Be able to hit your target under many given situations.

3. Practice, Practice, Practice, Practice.

And if practice makes perfect , then I have a long way to go and
not enough time left to get there. But, that doesn't mean that I
wont try. I will practice much and try to apply the princeples I
have learned here from you guys. THANKS

[HOSSISFREE]

Asking what makes a good shooter is like asking "How do you get to Carnagie Hall?"

A boatload of practice! I have fired rifles since I was 9yo. My last deer was a simple shot & drop at 350yds across the valley. I might humbly say I'm a decent shot with a rifle.

If you want to know what kind of shot you are try the Texas Stars out at PSC. I tried it on the TCHLforum day, and found out how bad a shot I truly am. Meanwhile, I can punch out the center of any target standing still and shooting a still target.

Hoss