tips for the indoor, paper punching range?

[marklbucla]

Skunkabilly dragged me out of the indoor ranges and into my first steel plate competition today. It was a ton of fun! Tad expensive though. I started off ok, but it went totally south after the first two stages. I found that slow controlled fire at paper targets is totally different from a steel match.

For the most part, I'm confined to the ~18 yard indoor ranges. No drawing from holsters, rapid fire, or running from lane to lane . What drills/exercises can I do there in order to improve my times?

 

[caz223]

Running and gunning is a lot of fun, isn't it?
Just keep going to the matches, and talking to people you meet.
They all have a little story on what helped them.

 

[1911Tuner]

Practice Drills

Put up a white paper plate(s) at an appropriate range in your
garage/basement/living room, and practice your draw with
an empty gun. If it's a 1911, dry firing it won't hurt it. If it
bothers you, cut a piece of leather or plastic to fit the space
on top of the firing pin stop.

After you get smooth and fast with sight alignment, put a
2-inch red target dot in the center of the plate for a smaller
target to aim for. Practice in slow motion until you get smooth
and sure with the draw.

When you stop practicing, take the plates down so you won't
have a brainfart and do a practice run at your fridge with a loaded
gun....This happens more than you would think. A friend of
mine killed his microwave this way.

Tip:

Don't let the neighbors see you doing this. It tends to make'em
act strange when you stop to have a chat across the back yard fence.

Cheers!
Tuner

 

[10-Ring]

When I'm home, I try to dry fire my guns...usually do the dime on the front sight & fire as often as I can w/o dropping dime while aiming at door knob or TV or whatever. Also practice drawing & reholstering.

 

[Navy joe]

A good paper range practice for steel plates is to use an NRA 50ft pistol target, the one with four small bullseyes printed on the sheet. At about a 7-10yd range practice extending the gun from a muzzle downrange low ready out to sight alignment and getting the first shot off quickly. Repeat that a bunch until you can get good hits in a hurry. Then do transitions where you fire at one bullseye then move to the other. A pace of one shot per second ought not to get you into much range trouble and will probably speed you up for now. For further fun, never load more than two or three rounds while at the range, practice reloads!

Dryfire at home to kill the flinch, secret ally of steel plates everywhere.