For those that are decent at idpa or uspsa. I know it goes by time and how good your hits are. My ? is it better to give more focus on great hits or better to let your hits slack a little to go faster?
A lot of top trainers would prefer to see speed over accuracy. They feel its easier to teach a fast person how to hit than a slow person to speed up. The problem is they're culling through potential top shots. You are stuck with you.
Early on, your biggest gains are by learning to use economy of motion and doing as many things simultaneously as you can manage. Examples would be a perfect draw stroke (vs. fishing or bowling) and moving while drawing or reloading if the stage allows it.
Your speed should be balanced with accuracy. As your speed improves your accuracy will degrade if you're making significant progress. When that happens, maintain the speed and focus more on accuracy. Early on you want to practice up close. As you get faster you'll want to move the distances out farther.
An often overlooked but critical component is target transitions. You can practice your draw and reloads till you're super quick, but they'll only buy you so much time on each stage. You only draw once and reload 1-4 times depending on which game, but even a short IDPA stage will have 6 target transitions. Is it more important to gain a tenth on the draw or on the transition? Easy math.
There's lots more to learn, but you get the picture to start with.
Early on, your biggest gains are by learning to use economy of motion and doing as many things simultaneously as you can manage. Examples would be a perfect draw stroke (vs. fishing or bowling) and moving while drawing or reloading if the stage allows it.
Your speed should be balanced with accuracy. As your speed improves your accuracy will degrade if you're making significant progress. When that happens, maintain the speed and focus more on accuracy. Early on you want to practice up close. As you get faster you'll want to move the distances out farther.
An often overlooked but critical component is target transitions. You can practice your draw and reloads till you're super quick, but they'll only buy you so much time on each stage. You only draw once and reload 1-4 times depending on which game, but even a short IDPA stage will have 6 target transitions. Is it more important to gain a tenth on the draw or on the transition? Easy math.
There's lots more to learn, but you get the picture to start with.
I heard it explained to me earlier this year that you want to be shooting about 85% A-zone hits. If you are shooting less than that you are going too fast, and more you are going too slow. It sounds logical but I'm wondering if it applies across all classes. I wonder if the percentage would need to be tweaked for each class level. For instance, 95% A-Zone hits for a Grand Master, 90% for a Master, 88% for an A, etc. Or something to that along those lines. I don't know, I'm still too new at it.
There is an IPSC scoring program for Android phones in the Android market. It has a very neat feature in that you can plug in your time and all your hits. It will calculate your hit factor and the time you could have taken to get all A-zone hits and get the same score on that stage. It's very revealing and really drives home what Olyeller and GTG posted.
There is an IPSC scoring program for Android phones in the Android market. It has a very neat feature in that you can plug in your time and all your hits. It will calculate your hit factor and the time you could have taken to get all A-zone hits and get the same score on that stage. It's very revealing and really drives home what Olyeller and GTG posted.
From my little experience, I'll just say that it all depends...on the stage, on the level of competition, & on you the shooter. Since hit factor = points / time, it may be advantageous to shoot quick Charlies over Alphas..Speed is especially critical on those stages that are really short since hit factor is simply a ratio. The scoring is very intriguing. Look at how some open class shooters score with hit factor (especially w/ minor power factor) and you'll see what I mean.
But honestly...focus on being smooth, picking up your front sight and getting your hits. The biggest stumbling block you will hit is trying to go fast. It's a wall I ran into big time the last couple of weeks and it's frustrating. I'll give you an example...two weeks ago I managed to finish first on one stage and dead last the very next. Now I have to take a step back from where I thought I was and focus on the fundamentals. You have to master the basics before you can get speedy with it.
Disclaimer once more...I'm a rookie.
But honestly...focus on being smooth, picking up your front sight and getting your hits. The biggest stumbling block you will hit is trying to go fast. It's a wall I ran into big time the last couple of weeks and it's frustrating. I'll give you an example...two weeks ago I managed to finish first on one stage and dead last the very next. Now I have to take a step back from where I thought I was and focus on the fundamentals. You have to master the basics before you can get speedy with it.
Disclaimer once more...I'm a rookie.
General rule of thumb for USPSA, if the stage takes less than 10 seconds speed is king, 7-15 BOTH speed and accuracy, over 15 accuracy by far. and I do believe OlYeller ment you can't miss fast enough to win, you might out run a singlee miss, but if you got a bunch, no way. The 85% thing is about right all across classes, but the speed is WAY different! I can't stress this too much just like the rest have said, BASICS, BASICS, BASICS
For IDPA accuracy, accuracy, accuracy
For IDPA accuracy, accuracy, accuracy
thanks all!
It depends on what sport and then what division within that sport.
You can work out the points per second before you shoot a stage and figure out gains/losses for poor hits based on how much time you can save. This is gonna require you to be aware of how long it takes you to perform certain skills. In USPSA your power factor will also come into play since you don't earn great points for poor hits when shooting minor. There is very little time difference to shoot an A versus a D and the point difference is huge.
Coming from a mid pack shooter I can give you this advice. GET YOUR HITS! You can be a real speed demon, but it will only get you to a certain point, you have to let the speed just happen.
Which leads to another issue, learn what you have to see to make hits at various ranges and use that during matches and practice. Shoot to your sights and just allow the speed to be what it is. Try to get better at the other aspects of whatever sport you choose. Draws, reloads, and mostly stage management will get you farther than hosing will.
You can work out the points per second before you shoot a stage and figure out gains/losses for poor hits based on how much time you can save. This is gonna require you to be aware of how long it takes you to perform certain skills. In USPSA your power factor will also come into play since you don't earn great points for poor hits when shooting minor. There is very little time difference to shoot an A versus a D and the point difference is huge.
Coming from a mid pack shooter I can give you this advice. GET YOUR HITS! You can be a real speed demon, but it will only get you to a certain point, you have to let the speed just happen.
Which leads to another issue, learn what you have to see to make hits at various ranges and use that during matches and practice. Shoot to your sights and just allow the speed to be what it is. Try to get better at the other aspects of whatever sport you choose. Draws, reloads, and mostly stage management will get you farther than hosing will.
I had been waiting to chime in here because if this little stipulation you put on us but after seeing who all posted the term decent is obviously being used very loosely.
Kurt hit the nail on the head with his talk of speed being important in the fast stages and accuracy being important on the slow stages. If the hit factors that are being shot on a stage are over 8 then it's time to start shooting faster. If they are below 4 then get your A's. Now when I say faster I mean shoot for all A's but don't fret over several C's.
The Math boils down to the fact that the hit factor is the amount of points every second is worth. So if you have a shooter that has turned in a tip score with a 15 hit factor on a stage(which is high) you need to be hitting 15 points per second or 3 A's per second or 5 C's per second or some combination to keep pace.
A good example I was at a match where the round count for my buddy shooting SS had him reloading for the last shot. The hit factor was in the 10's for most of us. A fast reload is 1.5-2 seconds for most of us so he could get his last 5 points and add 2 seconds to his time or he could give up the 5 points for the A and take the 10 point penalty for the miss and save the 2 seconds. With each second being worth 10 points the math says to skip the reload and call it quits.
