As humans a lot of times our perceptions can be off -- especially about the passing of time. Our faulty perceptions might actually be setting us back in the way we improve in our handgun shooting, so let's take a look at a simple drill in the video below which can help set us up on the path for success.
It's called the five by five by five by five drill and it consists of:
Shooting five shots
At five yards
In a circle that's five inches
In under five seconds.
Here's how it works. I'm going to start at a low ready which means my firearm is out but is depressed below the target so I have a view of the target. On the timer -- when it goes off -- I come up onto my five inch circle and I attempt to shoot all five shots inside the five inch circle inside of five seconds.
Take a look at my first string of fire on the video. Fail! I only got four shots in during the allotted time.
My perception of how long five seconds were going to be in my mind was not correct. I thought five seconds was going to be an abnormally long time to shoot, but guess what? It was faster than my perception was so using the shot timer set for five seconds is key. It is holding me accountable to that time frame whether my mind thinks it's slower or faster than it really is it doesn't matter it's objective from the time standpoint.
Let's say that I've done this drill enough and my fundamentals have gotten good enough that I can consistently use this as a baseline as like a benchmark of where my where my shooting abilities are. What if I could take the same drill and I could start looking at some variables to see if I can improve on them? One thing I can do is I can try to improve on the shot aspect, I can try to shoot more than five shots in the five second time frame
Another thing I can do is take a lateral step and still try to get my five shots on Target in the same time frame.
If I wanted, maybe I added more distance maybe it's not five yards anymore maybe it's six yards or maybe it's seven yards but I'm still trying to get all five shots in the five inch circle in five seconds
Now you've got a drill that you can use as a baseline you can use it as a metric that you want to improve to that point and then I've given you a couple ideas that you can do to try to press beyond that. Now remember it's just a drill but it gives you things to measure your improvement for shooting so you can keep going and keep getting better.
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