Short version: I took a Ben Stoeger class. I liked it. I think it may help.
Long version:
Background: In my hobbies, I am generally an autodidact. I read a lot about them, I will watch or listen to video or audio material, and I will have discussions with people who are better than me... but I very rarely embark on a course of formal "training" under the watchful eyes of a master. I got down to a 4 handicap in golf (e.g., shooting something only a little above par most of the time) at one point having only taken a grand total of 3 lessons (each of which I would rate a non-helpful disaster). I suspect this comes from having had little or no luck with the athletic coaching I got when I was a kid... it wasn't great.
I brought that approach to shooting in general, and to USPSA in particular. It probably drug my development out a bit longer/slower, but it was what I was used to doing, and I'm generally ok with slow progress on my hobbies. I have read a lot, including the books Ben Stoeger has written, along with the classic old Enos text, plus various other materials. I have listed to Stoeger's podcast (and also things from others) for a long time. Over time, I generally made progress - the newer me would usually beat the previous version of me.
But I've been shooting USPSA for almost 5 years now. I made A class around the start of this year and immediately plateued. Not only did I not get any better, I actually have gotten worse. I never racked up high numbers of A's (I'm a natural major PF guy... C's are fine with me and my psyche!), but I have always been decent at minimizing the big disasters (M's and NS's). This year, though, I started piling those up like crazy - probably averaging one per stage, and sometimes worse than that. I suspect part of it was the sudden prevalence of PCC and CO guns in the matches I shoot. It was easier to tune out what the few good open shooters were doing as being irrelevant, but when the guys that I used to wax started whaling on me with their be-dotted guns, I think that goaded me into trying crazy stuff too often and really trying to force improvements in shooting, movement, etc. It was all kind of backfiring on me, and I was just turning into kind of a mess. Throw on top the burnout of being MD of a weekly match for the last 3 years and I decided I was falling out of love with this game... time to actually fix stuff or take a break. So I signed up for a Stoeger class (his Fundamentals class, not his Skills and Drills) that many of my buddies have taken.
The class: 2-day format, 12 students, 2 large pistol bays at the range. Lots of shooting, no classroom time, only one instructor - Ben. No experience prerequisite, but a mix of shooting experience, competition experience, and overall skill. Lots of C and B shooters, one or two D's, and a couple of A's (one pretty solid and then me with my fouled-up current state). The first day was really focused on shooting targets at various distances, with Ben watching your gun and telling you what you were fouling up. We started with a cold run on a stage (that was one bay), and then went into drills/instruction on the second bay. We did some group shooting at the outset, but after the first 45 minutes, all other shooting is done at speed. Notably, however, Ben did not do a lot of calling out times (unless something was exceptional) or setting pars... given the disparate skill levels, he was more focused on the shooter having the right pace and approach for their skill level and helping them get the gun to behave better. At the end of the day, we re-shot the stage from the morning, and Ben provided some more input. I put 700+ rounds into the berms on the first day.
The second day started with Ben having built a different stage and cold runs from all the students. Then back to the other bay for lots more drills... with movement involved. For some of the students, just learning to move with aggression was a big focus. For others, Ben was working finer points of footwork and when to begin mounting the gun. Then we did some work on transitioning between targets of various difficulty and reloading (finishing with several reps of his classic accelerator drill). Then we finished up with a re-run of the stage from the morning. I went through another 600 rounds or so.
I should add that Ben demonstrated each of the drills, and he ran the stages for us (after we did our cold runs). Watching that was definitely impressive... that dude is not holding national and world championship trophies because of luck or random chance. Seeing him handle a small steel plate at ~25 yards while moving aggressively was insane, for instance.
What I took away: I got what I came for: some individualized guidance. Specifically, I knew my shooting was in poor health, but I needed a diagnosis. I wanted a keen set of eyes to look at what I was doing and cut to the heart of the problem in a constructive way (more than "do better").
Ben is really good at that. He had my number from the first cold run of the first day. He said my time was "pretty sporty" and guessed that I was one of the faster guys in my club. He also said I was too prone to being a "retard" and doing "monkey s***" stuff. Bullseye. He said I was over-gripping with my right hand and being too tense with my shoulders... trying to force transitions by muscling the gun around. I had never perceived myself as doing those things, but as soon as he said it, I knew he was right. He encouraged me (and others) to be more liberal in our use of target-focused shooting, as opposed to focusing on the front sight.* I used to do that, but I have gotten very front-sight oriented recently... and my shooting has gone to poop. He observed that I was pretty solid on ripping hits on close targets, and even reasonably competent at hard targets, but that I was screwing up the mid-range/mid-difficulty stuff because I was treating it exactly the same as the close stuff (in terms of pace, and the front-sight focus didn't magically make that OK). He really, really, really hammered at me that I needed to let the sights settle on those kind of targets... particularly when coming into a position. He pointed out that even the top-level shooters don't usually hit the same splits on the first target in an array that they do on the later ones, and that it's worth taking the extra tenth of a second to really get my grip sorted out before I go to blasting.
He gave very different advice to other shooters... not because he was BS'ing me or them, but because he was giving individualized instruction. A good golf pro wouldn't tell a hooker of the ball and a slicer of the ball the same thing... you would tell them some fundamental things that are common, but a lot of the coaching would be opposite. The medicine for one would be poison to the other, and vice versa. The same is probably true in shooting instruction.
I had an interesting experience on the end-of-day run on the 2nd day's stage (literally the last shooting of the class). I had train-wrecked the morning's run.** A real trash-fest, with multiple shots on steel and M's on a couple of targets... plus a frantic-feeling, but long-running 21+ seconds (which seemed even longer when Ben smashed it in 14 seconds). After Ben's increasingly, uh, assertive advice that I let the sights settle, I set up to start the afternoon's run with a mantra of really doing that. I shot the stage in a way that felt like I was riding the brakes on the shooting (not the moving)... and then Ben called a 17.07 time (with good-ish hits), which he characterized as "properly aggressive." It was nice to get that validation for a very tiring weekend's worth of work, but getting some clarity that my internal sense of when a shot is "taking too long" is not trustworthy was far more important.
Was it worth it/would I recommend: Yes. I paid $450 for the class and got a bunch of individualized guidance from a guy who is both a world-class competitor and a really astute observer/communicator. I wanted to leave with some clarity in how to go forward, and I have it. I also was hoping to get re-energized and really get my head and heart back into this game. I have that now. I would add that Ben is pretty dang entertaining if you like a sarcastic/wry sense of humor; he has a reputation for being kind of abrasive, but he was able to dial that up or down depending on the tolerance of the individual subject. I'm pretty thick skinned (I'm extremely aggravating to be around, so I'm used to lots of verbal abuse), so he went at me in a way that would be typical for guys messing around. Some of the other students were more reserved and/or potentially sensitive, and he dialed it back for them.
I have no idea if this super-long post is of interest to anyone but me, but I thought I'd lay out my thoughts and reactions in case someone was on the fence about whether to do this or something similar.
* I knew that he shot target-focused at longer distances than a lot of other good shooters, but during this class he was unequivocal that, these days, he NEVER shoots ANYTHING with a front-sight focus. He is all-target-focus-all-the-time... with both his Production and Limited iron-sighted guns.
** At that point, Ben correctly called out that I do get first stage jitters; I like to pretend I don't, but I ain't fooling nobody apparently.
Long version:
Background: In my hobbies, I am generally an autodidact. I read a lot about them, I will watch or listen to video or audio material, and I will have discussions with people who are better than me... but I very rarely embark on a course of formal "training" under the watchful eyes of a master. I got down to a 4 handicap in golf (e.g., shooting something only a little above par most of the time) at one point having only taken a grand total of 3 lessons (each of which I would rate a non-helpful disaster). I suspect this comes from having had little or no luck with the athletic coaching I got when I was a kid... it wasn't great.
I brought that approach to shooting in general, and to USPSA in particular. It probably drug my development out a bit longer/slower, but it was what I was used to doing, and I'm generally ok with slow progress on my hobbies. I have read a lot, including the books Ben Stoeger has written, along with the classic old Enos text, plus various other materials. I have listed to Stoeger's podcast (and also things from others) for a long time. Over time, I generally made progress - the newer me would usually beat the previous version of me.
But I've been shooting USPSA for almost 5 years now. I made A class around the start of this year and immediately plateued. Not only did I not get any better, I actually have gotten worse. I never racked up high numbers of A's (I'm a natural major PF guy... C's are fine with me and my psyche!), but I have always been decent at minimizing the big disasters (M's and NS's). This year, though, I started piling those up like crazy - probably averaging one per stage, and sometimes worse than that. I suspect part of it was the sudden prevalence of PCC and CO guns in the matches I shoot. It was easier to tune out what the few good open shooters were doing as being irrelevant, but when the guys that I used to wax started whaling on me with their be-dotted guns, I think that goaded me into trying crazy stuff too often and really trying to force improvements in shooting, movement, etc. It was all kind of backfiring on me, and I was just turning into kind of a mess. Throw on top the burnout of being MD of a weekly match for the last 3 years and I decided I was falling out of love with this game... time to actually fix stuff or take a break. So I signed up for a Stoeger class (his Fundamentals class, not his Skills and Drills) that many of my buddies have taken.
The class: 2-day format, 12 students, 2 large pistol bays at the range. Lots of shooting, no classroom time, only one instructor - Ben. No experience prerequisite, but a mix of shooting experience, competition experience, and overall skill. Lots of C and B shooters, one or two D's, and a couple of A's (one pretty solid and then me with my fouled-up current state). The first day was really focused on shooting targets at various distances, with Ben watching your gun and telling you what you were fouling up. We started with a cold run on a stage (that was one bay), and then went into drills/instruction on the second bay. We did some group shooting at the outset, but after the first 45 minutes, all other shooting is done at speed. Notably, however, Ben did not do a lot of calling out times (unless something was exceptional) or setting pars... given the disparate skill levels, he was more focused on the shooter having the right pace and approach for their skill level and helping them get the gun to behave better. At the end of the day, we re-shot the stage from the morning, and Ben provided some more input. I put 700+ rounds into the berms on the first day.
The second day started with Ben having built a different stage and cold runs from all the students. Then back to the other bay for lots more drills... with movement involved. For some of the students, just learning to move with aggression was a big focus. For others, Ben was working finer points of footwork and when to begin mounting the gun. Then we did some work on transitioning between targets of various difficulty and reloading (finishing with several reps of his classic accelerator drill). Then we finished up with a re-run of the stage from the morning. I went through another 600 rounds or so.
I should add that Ben demonstrated each of the drills, and he ran the stages for us (after we did our cold runs). Watching that was definitely impressive... that dude is not holding national and world championship trophies because of luck or random chance. Seeing him handle a small steel plate at ~25 yards while moving aggressively was insane, for instance.
What I took away: I got what I came for: some individualized guidance. Specifically, I knew my shooting was in poor health, but I needed a diagnosis. I wanted a keen set of eyes to look at what I was doing and cut to the heart of the problem in a constructive way (more than "do better").
Ben is really good at that. He had my number from the first cold run of the first day. He said my time was "pretty sporty" and guessed that I was one of the faster guys in my club. He also said I was too prone to being a "retard" and doing "monkey s***" stuff. Bullseye. He said I was over-gripping with my right hand and being too tense with my shoulders... trying to force transitions by muscling the gun around. I had never perceived myself as doing those things, but as soon as he said it, I knew he was right. He encouraged me (and others) to be more liberal in our use of target-focused shooting, as opposed to focusing on the front sight.* I used to do that, but I have gotten very front-sight oriented recently... and my shooting has gone to poop. He observed that I was pretty solid on ripping hits on close targets, and even reasonably competent at hard targets, but that I was screwing up the mid-range/mid-difficulty stuff because I was treating it exactly the same as the close stuff (in terms of pace, and the front-sight focus didn't magically make that OK). He really, really, really hammered at me that I needed to let the sights settle on those kind of targets... particularly when coming into a position. He pointed out that even the top-level shooters don't usually hit the same splits on the first target in an array that they do on the later ones, and that it's worth taking the extra tenth of a second to really get my grip sorted out before I go to blasting.
He gave very different advice to other shooters... not because he was BS'ing me or them, but because he was giving individualized instruction. A good golf pro wouldn't tell a hooker of the ball and a slicer of the ball the same thing... you would tell them some fundamental things that are common, but a lot of the coaching would be opposite. The medicine for one would be poison to the other, and vice versa. The same is probably true in shooting instruction.
I had an interesting experience on the end-of-day run on the 2nd day's stage (literally the last shooting of the class). I had train-wrecked the morning's run.** A real trash-fest, with multiple shots on steel and M's on a couple of targets... plus a frantic-feeling, but long-running 21+ seconds (which seemed even longer when Ben smashed it in 14 seconds). After Ben's increasingly, uh, assertive advice that I let the sights settle, I set up to start the afternoon's run with a mantra of really doing that. I shot the stage in a way that felt like I was riding the brakes on the shooting (not the moving)... and then Ben called a 17.07 time (with good-ish hits), which he characterized as "properly aggressive." It was nice to get that validation for a very tiring weekend's worth of work, but getting some clarity that my internal sense of when a shot is "taking too long" is not trustworthy was far more important.
Was it worth it/would I recommend: Yes. I paid $450 for the class and got a bunch of individualized guidance from a guy who is both a world-class competitor and a really astute observer/communicator. I wanted to leave with some clarity in how to go forward, and I have it. I also was hoping to get re-energized and really get my head and heart back into this game. I have that now. I would add that Ben is pretty dang entertaining if you like a sarcastic/wry sense of humor; he has a reputation for being kind of abrasive, but he was able to dial that up or down depending on the tolerance of the individual subject. I'm pretty thick skinned (I'm extremely aggravating to be around, so I'm used to lots of verbal abuse), so he went at me in a way that would be typical for guys messing around. Some of the other students were more reserved and/or potentially sensitive, and he dialed it back for them.
I have no idea if this super-long post is of interest to anyone but me, but I thought I'd lay out my thoughts and reactions in case someone was on the fence about whether to do this or something similar.
* I knew that he shot target-focused at longer distances than a lot of other good shooters, but during this class he was unequivocal that, these days, he NEVER shoots ANYTHING with a front-sight focus. He is all-target-focus-all-the-time... with both his Production and Limited iron-sighted guns.
** At that point, Ben correctly called out that I do get first stage jitters; I like to pretend I don't, but I ain't fooling nobody apparently.
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