Breaking Down A Drill To Improve - Ben Stoeger's Close 90

[dustyvarmint]

I've been running Ben Stoeger's Close 90 Dry-Fire in my dry fire program. http://benstoeger.com/joomla30/index...close-90-close

He notes that beginner time should be 2.8 seconds. I ran my best times last night at 3.3 seconds. So, significantly slow... My greatest increase came from understanding that I had to be rotating my upper torso WHILE performing the reload. I also note that I've not been a very coordinated person my whole life.

I've seen Caleb's advice on breaking down a drill and I've read ToddG's advice from today's blog entry (Speed vs. Accuracy) and a previous blog entry about how practicing the same thing over and over again won't necessarily lead to improvement. With the exception of rotate torso I already dry fire practice the other steps; draw, execute shot, rotate torso while reloading and execute shot.

What is a good approach to improve the total drill?

happy shooting, dv

[Sal Picante]

This and the similar 4 Aces drill are really tough drills!

Basically, either everything works to a T or you crash and burn...

The trouble really is with the reload: Assuming you can do a 1-1.1 draw and follow up with .20's, that leaves you with 1.3s to really get a good reload on board.

That should be the focus, being able to consistently hit a 1.3 reload on the more static 4 aces, then extending it to the 90 degree example.

Some observations I've had:
1.) fundamentals of looking the reload "in" still apply, even if you are moving.
2.) pushing the reload faster is frustrating... It should be. work at a comfortable speed, then really get on the gas to break kittens.
3.) Relax a lot - I noticed I tended to blow reloads when I was tensing, trying to force them to happen.

In the past month, I've finally gotten my reloads down under a second.. There is more ground to take here, but it is happening pretty consistently. As to "overtraining" - reloads are probably the toughest problem I have right now. I spend about 60% of my time with drills that force me to reload. I think continual exposure to a technique really helps engrain it (during dry fire) I guess you could reach a point of diminishing returns, but 30 minutes on reloads a day and 50 rd worth of ammo hitting this drill and 4 aces and "Can You Count" (USPSA classifier) isn't excessive in my book. (typical practice session for me is about 100 rds)