100 Round Pistol Drill With Travis Haley

[Ben]

I thought this was a good pistol drill. I like these drills where you start slow and increase speed, vs trying to always be fast from the gitgo. It's also a good reality check for me when I see a skilled person's "fast" at the longer ranges. I always think I'm a slow poke past ten yards (well, I am, but not as slow as I think).

A lot of Travis's drills start with a slow (like 5 second) draw and fire, and you keep increasing speed by a second, until you start to get sloppy, then you dial back and practice more. It's an especially good way, IMO, to force yourself back into good form if you haven't been to the range for a while.

He doesn't mention what those targets are called. Does anyone know?

https://youtu.be/kHtJ4a7XVPo

[dogmush]

I like that, and it's good for your muscle memory to do the start slow thing.  It keeps you from building training scars by being sloppy.

It's also important to practice your cold shooting.  I like to do the first couple (like less than 10) shots a session at full speed.  It let's me know where my skills are really at.  THen I can back off speed and work on technique while adding speed and/or smaller targets back in as the session progresses.

I also do all my dry-fire practice at about 2/3rds speed to really work on managing movements.

not to put too fine a point on it, but if you ever really need to use a gun, those first couple shots out of the holster, cold, are likely to be the only ones that really matter.

[Ben]

It's also important to practice your cold shooting.  I like to do the first couple (like less than 10) shots a session at full speed.  It let's me know where my skills are really at.  THen I can back off speed and work on technique while adding speed and/or smaller targets back in as the session progresses.

That's good thinking.

Also, apparently Haley Strategic sells those targets at $50 for 50.

[Ben]

I just got back from doing most of this drill at the gun club. I like it. I didn't have his targets, but found some rifle targets in the man cave that worked okay for the precision stuff, and used regular silhouettes for the rest.

I've never done the eyes closed drill before. All I can say, for any bad guys that might be involved in whatever weird situation would have me shooting blind, be prepared to be gut shot. 

I was really shooting low there. I modified it somewhat to also include drawing and firing with my eyes shut (Travis was just shutting his eyes after aligning on target) and that was even lower. I'm not sure exactly what that says about my form, but there's probably something negative going on. Doing it the way Travis did it, I was much better, but still a bit low. Actually a bit low and right, and as a lefty, I'm wondering if "eyes closed" is making me have bad trigger form?

[French G.]

I like that, and it's good for your muscle memory to do the start slow thing.  It keeps you from building training scars by being sloppy.

It's also important to practice your cold shooting.  I like to do the first couple (like less than 10) shots a session at full speed.  It let's me know where my skills are really at.  THen I can back off speed and work on technique while adding speed and/or smaller targets back in as the session progresses.

I also do all my dry-fire practice at about 2/3rds speed to really work on managing movements.

not to put too fine a point on it, but if you ever really need to use a gun, those first couple shots out of the holster, cold, are likely to be the only ones that really matter.

When I actually practiced my first bit was always the carry gun as I had carried it to the range. No checks on the gun or spare ammunition. I stopped carrying micro autos as spare guns because of that. Too many surprises.