From what I've seen Gabe's reaction to the beep is about as good as it gets, which is to say as good as practically every decent USPSA shooter. Unless you jump the clock (cheat), there really isn't much to be gained once you "get it". Limits of human performance top out.
Gabe's ability to modulate acceleration and deceleration is amazing. That's the holy grail of consistent, accurate, fast shots from the draw.
“There is no growth in the comfort zone.”--Jocko Willink
"You can never have too many knives." --Joe Ambercrombie
According to Google, the average human reaction time to an audible sound is .17 seconds. The reaction times of the top Olympic sprinters in the world range from about .12-.16 seconds. So even if you're an average Joe, you're only .05 seconds off the best in the world. Translated to shooting, the reaction time difference between two shooters will be such a small percentage of the overall time, even on short drills like draw and fire 1 shot, that it's not even worth worrying about.
A more common error I've seen shooters make with regards to reaction time, is they will wait until the beep is over to start moving rather than as soon as the beep starts. This will result in about a 0.50+ second reaction. This is an execution error on the shooters part and not caused by a lack of capability.
Like anything with shooting, it's all about efficiency/economy of movement. If you have wasted movement when your hands go to the gun, or when the gun is drawn from the holster, or on the path of the gun to the target, or after the gun is at full extension but before the shot breaks, you will be adding time to your run. You can see the person standing behind Gabe that is shadow-gunning has a significant amount of wasted movement throughout this process.
Last edited by Gio; 06-16-2017 at 01:52 PM.
@Mr_White
I know you run a single T-shirt model. From the video, it looks like the absurd efficiency with which you clear the shirt is enabled by its resting in a very consistent position.
How does your clearing technique carry over to drawing on the move and from less perfect start positions? Do you ever have issues missing the shirt?
I have a bunch of a certain Champion C9 t-shirt that was sold at Target a few years ago. (They are still sold there, but change a little bit each season.) You can see me wearing the t-shirt in a lot of my match and older shooting videos. It's a little over the line as concealment outside of a permissive gun environment, so now most of the time I use the Champion C9 polo shirt like in the video, which is a little roomier and conceals better (and takes a little more care to clear too.) That's what you see me wearing in almost all my videos other than those where I have the t-shirt. I also wear an unrelated black polo in some of them, which is my work shirt at the range, but pretty similar to the Champion polo.Originally Posted by dove
Yes. I believe disaster factor is inherent to the use of concealment. It can be minimized through practice, but it's still there. I think I do a reasonably consistent job clearing my shirt, but sometimes I miss it, sure.
Well...I definitely pick the shirts that I do because I think they work well. However, practice is where I think I really get the efficiency from. I do want the shirt in a consistent position, but way more importantly, I want my support hand to reliably clear the shirt regardless of whether it is hanging exactly this way or that way. Specifically, I think clearing the shirt efficiently is facilitated by having my support hand a little curled/fingers already set to hook the shirt on the way up, having my support hand fingers in contact with my pant leg rather than floating out in space, AND having that start position be pretty natural and non-threatening looking and thus non-telegraphic.
Drawing on the move: I think it translates just great. If my hands start below the hemline, I lift the shirt. If my hands start out above the hemline, I grab and bunch the shirt at the diaphragm area. Works great both ways.
Less perfect start positions: Not sure exactly what you mean. If I took you to mean "all the infinite start positions one could find oneself in", oddball positioning is something that comes up constantly in USPSA. I tend to work through those with the above-the-hemline bunching method. I certainly have screwed up my draw in matches, but it certainly hasn't been frequently either. I'll see if I can grab some draws from matches to show you.
Technical excellence supports tactical preparedness
Lord of the Food Court
http://www.gabewhitetraining.com
Thanks!
What I meant about the consistent resting position was that it looks like the scoop technique relies on the shirt hem hanging out a little from your waist so as to create a handle you can lift straight up. And yea, as far as less perfect positions I just mean anything more awkward (bent over, leaning, sitting, etc.), anything that might not keep the shirt in that exactly that position.
I've gone back and forth between the above-the-hem bunching and a variation of the straight lift like that (actually more of a hem bunch on the way up). Recently I've noticed myself totally blowing clears in dryfire with the straight lift when I get too antsy and rush into reps. Somehow, I don't seem to screw that up on the buzzer as much, but it still bugs me and I was curious to hear your perspective on it as I've been gravitating towards the bunching approach and away from the straight lift as a way of having a more reliable technique.
ETA: Just ran some air draws. It looks like my variation of the straight lift is more of a scoop/semi-bunch hook a bit above the hemline. I run a consistent shirt, but it's longer than yours and the hem lays flat against my pants.
Last edited by GRV; 06-16-2017 at 03:36 PM.
When I miss it like you are talking about, it is almost always because I let my support hand lift further away from my body rather than staying tight to it. Everything you said there is why my I put my support hand fingers in contact with my pant leg on a hands-down start. It does help if my shirt blouses out. It does not always do that though, and sometimes it is flat on my leg. Still gotta make sure to get it with those fingers.
If bunching the garment from a higher position across the board on all draws helps you, go with it. Nothing wrong with that. For me, I like dividing it between hands-below-the-hemline starts and hands-above-the-hemline starts. Because of the infinite start positions in life, and the seemingly endless variations they manufacture in matches, there ends up being a great many subtle draw variations anyway.
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My draw in movement and with varied start positions
Draws on the move:
Draws in matches:
I isolated just the draws from all the match videos I had close at hand on the computer. I excluded off-body starts (pick up gun off table, etc.) There certainly are some straightforward draws with a hands-down start to a target pretty much right in front of me....but not many (looked like about 20% of them to me.) There are a lot of varied hand start positions - hands-up, hands-down, hands touching some specific spot on or off my body, hands holding something, etc. - and lots of turns, movement, and leans required along with the draw.
Technical excellence supports tactical preparedness
Lord of the Food Court
http://www.gabewhitetraining.com
I seem to remember a post where Les compared your reload speed to his. I can't find the thread, but I believe he was saying your reaction time to the beep was crazy fast.
"Next time somebody says USPSA or IPSC is all hosing, junk punch them." - Les Pepperoni
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Gabe, can you talk about how you grip the pistol out of the holster? Why do you flag your thumb on the back of the slide instead of driving the thumb behind the pistol? Is it left over from your early work with appendix draws or is there another reason for it?
How much downward pressure do you put on the pistol as take your grip? I've always thought your draw had two distinct sounds. One as you acquire your grip and one as the pistol clears the holster. It's almost a double click. I've often wondered about how much downward force you put into the pistol during the draw.
What is your perceived path to the target? It looks like you bring the pistol very high and then drive very straight from your dominate eye to the target?
Last edited by MGW; 06-16-2017 at 09:22 PM.
“If you know the way broadly you will see it in everything." - Miyamoto Musashi
FWIW, my observations on the difference between Gabe and and a few high level technically skilled shooters and those of us with less skill, during the class. The reaction time, tempo, ability to transition between targets, time to first shot and the consistency in which they are able to do it . They make it look effortless, but I know it took a lot of effort to get to that point
Its hard to describe, but with multiple shooters on the line you can really see/hear a BIG difference. ie some draws looked really smooth and fast but then the gun was on target and I was thinkin, SHOOT SHOOT, dammm what took them so long to pull the trigger? I know I am guilty of doing the same thing at times.
I was once on the line with failure2stop shooting next to me.
I remember quite clearly hearing his gun fire while I was only at position two of my draw.
"To achieve any significant technological breakthrough, much Derp must be endured." -Rich@CCC
"Your shotgun is running a bit frenetic, you should add some lavender to your lubricant, that should calm it down." -Aray, Oils and Lotions SME
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