Posted by Jerry on December 15, 2001 at 17:09:06:
Greetings,
Good News:
Got my Morini in early September, I have put 10,000 pellets through the rascal ( two sleeves of Vogel Greens). It took the scuba tank down 1000 psi to 2000 psi and I was down to 60 shots per cylinder. Today I took the tank back to the dive shop for a refresh back to 3000 psi. I have no complaints about the Morini except that the trigger feels a bit too crisp for me after I get a bit tired. I have not completely missed the trap ( a "Matusic" model) since I have moved indoors ( Got the clip board once and the right edge of the trap once).
Bad News:
I still can't shoot my way out of a soggy paper bag. I think I know what to do but my ( 63 year old ) body keeps betraying me...
1) Focusing on the front sight seems to make my grip relax.
2) After I initially settle down, my shoulder "spontaneously" wants to drop the muzzle about 2-3 rings.
3) I still suffer from excessive trembling (especially if I have to hold for more than a couple of seconds ). The trembling occurs when I attempt to squeeze the trigger.
I am starting to get a lot more shots in the nine and ten rings but most targets are "ruined" by 1-3 wild shots. It is sorta hard to build a good average when you nail the 2 or 3 ring ;( I take 10 shots per target.
I am a cross dominant (left eyed right handed). I am starting to think I might be time to try a pair of left handed grips. My right eye is basically uncorrectable to anything reasonable.
Jerry
Posted by Roland Cannon on December 15, 2001 at 17:50:52:
Welcome to the club! . At 35 years old I still get my butt kicked by my shooting friend who saw 60 when the original Bush was president.
Maybe this is why we participate in this sport. I remember video games getting really boring after a person beat them. Imagine perfect tens without practice? How fun would that be?
I am not sure I can ever be a great shooter. Hell, I would be happy with average, but what keeps me shooting is that feeling of the rare perfect shot. It makes me think I have the ability. Perhaps if my concentration level improves to the level of an normal 4 year old I might see some improvement!
Posted by RML on December 15, 2001 at 19:40:12:
If you have been shooting only since September, then there is no reason to expect to much. Even if you do the same amount of practice in 3 months that other people have spent 3 years doing, it wont take you to the same level. Your muscles, your mind, and your nerves take time to adapt to this strange activity. But wait until next September! There won’t be any holes in the 1 an 2 rings.
Regards,
RML
Posted by Edward McAlpine on December 15, 2001 at 21:56:54:
Hi: you raise a couple of different issues not all of which I have experience with. I am returning to target shooting after a long layoff in the fifteen year range and it is a wakeup call!
There is some short period of grace between settling your aim and the onset of nasty tremor-Use it! Consciously shooting aggressively or else canceling the shot (lowering pistol) has helped me a lot.
Grip decay is one of those things that creeps in and requires conscious assertion, just like follow-through. There are matters of form that can be ignored with small consequence but it is the basics that were allowed to slip that always seem to be behind the truly gaffed shot.(IMHO)
You might consider shooting glasses as most corrective lenses are "correct" only in the center and are less accurate at the margins. The
iris also helps center the eye and maintain uniform head position. I don't yet use them myself
but it seems that lots of serious shooters do, and you seem to have made a serious commitment, so they are probably worth considering.
Good Luck, Ed
Posted by Warren on December 15, 2001 at 22:25:14:
Hi Jerry,
I really don't know why you think you're Robinson Crusoe. Three months is not all it takes to master this sport, in fact there's a lot to be said for your progress if you focus on the positives (70-80% of shots) rather than the negatives.
Forget about the cross dominant thing, it doesn't matter. Roberto di Donna (Olympic gold medallist 1996) and Annemarie Forder (Olympic bronze medallist 2000) both shoot that way.
I'll harp on this until the cows come home, and one day it will click and you'll wonder why it never made so much sense before... Hold the sight Formation and let the shot go off by itself. DO NOT try to pin the sights to a point on the target and if the shot does not surprise you, you HAVE NOT done it right.
Posted by mako on December 16, 2001 at 03:04:57:
You might want to add some light weight lifting ... side and front lifts with light to moderate weight ... to build up your shoulders, wrist rolls with a light weight and some type of hand squeeze exercise ... these will all help against premature trembling.
Even though it's boring (IMO), try out dry firing ... against a point on the wall. This will allow you to concentrate on the front sight and trigger squeeze so that you can see the interaction between the two ... without being distracted by a shot. Also warm up by dry firing against the back of a target ... again so that you can study the relationship between trigger, hold and front sight ... without the distraction of a "bullseye."
And do warm up exercises so that your shoulder, arm, wrist muscles will last longer without getting sore. And then take some Advil anyway. (Joke! :-)
And if you haven't yet ... Check out the Nygord notes, Warren's Hitchhikers Guide notes on the Pilkgun site, read the interviews with elite shooters on the pilkgun site, the US Army Marksmanship notes, Bullseye Encyclopedia (great collection of shooting articles) ...
http://www.nygord-precision.com/notes.htm (World Champion's recommendations)
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Dreyer_infonet/amu-pmtg.htm (US Army pistol marksmanship manual web page)
http://www.bullseyepistol.com/ (excellent collection of general pistol shooting article)
http://nassa.org/ (postal match with coaching feedback from US Shooting team asst. coach Wong)
http://www.pilkguns.com/hhg.htm (Warren's excellent collection of wisdom)
http://www.pilkguns.com/intervie.htm (Interviews with elite shooters, incl. training methods)
And to be brutally honest ... some people do tremble too much ... :-( But first try out all of the suggestions and check out all of the literature before giving up. You can then always try one of the two handed shooting sports such as air pistol silhouette shooting ... or even bench rest rifle shooting ..... :-) Good luck, and like others have suggested ... the journey IS the fun part ....
Posted by Bubba on December 16, 2001 at 11:23:20:
Jerry,
I am 54 years old, and a beginner 10m shooter. I have been through quite a few pistols in the three years that I have been a beginner. I am self taught, and there is no pistol competition anywhere near my home in Southwest Missouri. With the help of Warren and Scott this journey, and search for the "magic" Pistol has been fun and interesting. So, I offer the following comments, based on what I think I have learned.
:Got my Morini in early September, I have put 10,000 pellets through the rascal ( two sleeves of Vogel Greens).
Just a rough guess, but that is about 97 days. If you shot every day you are averaging 103.9 shots per day. Now if you figure that there are days that you don't get to shoot, for whatever reason, you are doing some intensive shooting. Even at your current rate of fire, 97 days is barely, if not enough time to get to know the pistol.
I have no complaints about the Morini except that the trigger feels a bit too crisp for me after I get a bit tired. I have not completely missed the trap ( a "Matusic" model) since I have moved indoors ( Got the clip board once and the right edge of the trap once).
What? No wall of shame behind the pellet trap? You are doing far better than I did when I moved indoors. Spackeling compound was my friend.
: Bad News:
: I still can't shoot my way out of a soggy paper bag. I think I know what to do but my ( 63 year old ) body keeps betraying me...
Well, there you have it, shooing from within a soggy paper bag is not listed as an exercise in any of the sights Mako listed, I know, I have been to all of them :-)
: 1) Focusing on the front sight seems to make my grip relax.
Been there done that. Got to learn to focus on both. At least starting out. You will eventually get to the point that you recognize the loosening of your grip, by the position of the sight, and make corrections in a split second, without much conscious thought.
: 2) After I initially settle down, my shoulder "spontaneously" wants to drop the muzzle about 2-3 rings.
See #1. If your grip relaxes, your front sight will drop, if you set the pistol up with a tighter grip.
: 3) I still suffer from excessive trembling ( especially if I have to hold for more than a couple of seconds ). The trembling occurs when I attempt to squeeze the trigger.
Ok, I think there is holding the pistol in a firing position, and then holding in a sighting position. Two seconds is probably about as long as anyone tries to hold a sight picture. You may want to try and speed that part up a little. i do a long hold sometimes in practice, just to prove to myself that it does not work. Besides, it's good physical exercise.
: I am starting to get a lot more shots in the nine and ten rings but most targets are "ruined" by 1-3 wild shots. It is sorta hard to build a good average when you nail the 2 or 3 ring ;( I take 10 shots per target.
I am still doing this. Not quite as often as I used to, but still often enough to ruin a good score. Stop and analyze what just happened and learn from it.
: I am a cross dominant (left eyed right handed). I am starting to think I might be time to try a pair of left handed grips. My right eye is basically uncorrectable to anything reasonable.
A problem that I have not had to deal with. Although my arms have shortened up some, causing me to hold reading material a little farther away, with some magnification in my glasses for shooting i have no problem.
Jerry,
I want to encourage you to continue shooting. You are gonna have to make some adjustments. You are tackling this like you are sorting wildcats. I would respectfully suggest that you have not given this enough time. I know the feeling, being a typical type A personality myself. If you are not done so already, go and read all of the sites that Mako suggested. Then shoot and analyze. Then read them again. The second or third time you are going to pick up more, if you shoot between the time spent reading and apply the concepts offered. Evaluate the results, and use what works for you.
I do not profess to be an expert. On a good day I only achieve 86% of a possible, and that is up from 70% when I started about three years ago. Just hope you can use some of my experiences.
Respectfully,
Bubba
Posted by Mike M on December 16, 2001 at 14:01:04:
Dry fire! Dry fire! Dry fire!
When I first started messing with 10m pistol two years ago, I thought dry firing was for sissies. After all, pellets don't cost hardly anything. Why not go ahead and shoot a pellet if you are going to go through all that effort to mimic firing?
Well, dry firing has taken my shooting to the next plateau. After just a few sessions of dry firing, my scores went up. Simply amazing.
Dry firing lets you concentrate on sight alignment and not yanking the pistol around when you pull the trigger. It helped me tremendously. I'm now flirting with a 90% average, after struggling for a year to break 90%. Couldn't be happier.
HTH
Mike
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