How should I practice?

To complete any of my classes, you must demonstrate the ability to handle your firearm safely, load it and put it into action, quickly and effectively engage your intended target, take your firearm safely back out of action, and store and maintain it for further use later.  So far, so good.  But as I remind every student, skills demonstrated on class day deteriorate, and they deteriorate rapidly.  The only way to retain the skills from any class or training, and to improve, is to PRACTICE.

In every sporting or even work discipline, particularly those involving manual skills, it's obvious that practice is important to maintaining and improving proficiency.  People don't need to be convinced of this--they accept it as a matter of course, even if they don't do it.  But why then, do shooters, as a group, fail to practice often if ever?

I think the answer is simple.  People think the act of shooting is so simple that they don't have to practice.  Lots of excuses are offerred--no time, too expensive, no good place to shoot, and on and on.  But even as these are offered, people know they should practice, especially when they try to handle their firearm again after a period off.

My theory:  It's a mental thing.  Even soldiers and police find ways to avoid shooting, and in the worst cases, of even handling their firearms.  Rationalizations are creative beyond belief.  It's been twenty five years since I was in an armed Army combat unit, so things may have changed, but I remember having to push units to get to the range, shoot, train for combat.  Firearms training is high risk for leaders in a peacetime Army.  I encountered few officers who pursued shooting as an individual passion and sought personal improvement, and frankly, I wasn't that good at it while on active duty.  I have become FAR more proficient since retirement.

So what kind of practice should we have?

First and foremost, practice frequently.  I am now in the unique situation of being able to easily and conveniently practice ever two to three days.  But I realize that most cannot do anything like this.  Still, I think it is worth it for anyone who relies on firearms for any specific purpose to practice at least monthly--more frequent is better and less frequent is worse. Optimum would probably be to shoot 1-2 magazines or cylinder's full every week. 

Second, don't lose bullets.  Use targets big enough that all your bullet strikes are known.  If you have to use a target backing that's the side of a big screen TV box, either do that or bring your target in close enough that you can see where every bullet hits.  It's only when you know where your bullets are striking that you can identify and correct problems.

Third, learn the fundamentals.  Don't just memorize the list, but use the fundamentals as a framework to analyze yourself, how you're shooting and what you're actually doing.  It's only when you know what you're doing that you can adjust if necessary to make the bullet hit where you want it to.  And remember, accuracy first, then speed.

Finally, remember practice doesn't make perfect, practice makes permanent.  Don't do the same thing over and over and expect different results.  Only Congress does that.