Posted: 3/14/2010 1:12:57 PM EDT
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Got back behind a scoped rifle today for the first time in 6-7 months and could not put together a decent 5 shot string. shot 8 five shot groups and only 1 measured sub MOA. All the others were 1.5 MOA. The rifle is a proven sub MOA performer with handloads, which I was shooting. I spent the winter shooting C&R rifles when the weather cooperated but did no precision shooting. Is shooting with optics a perishable skill? or as long as you are shooting something do you retain all your skills. If you lose something what regemine do you under take to get it back and how long does it take? |
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Quoted:
Got back behind a scoped rifle today for the first time in 6-7 months and could not put together a decent 5 shot string. shot 8 five shot groups and only 1 measured sub MOA. All the others were 1.5 MOA. The rifle is a proven sub MOA performer with handloads, which I was shooting. I spent the winter shooting C&R rifles when the weather cooperated but did no precision shooting. Is shooting with optics a perishable skill? or as long as you are shooting something do you retain all your skills. If you lose something what regemine do you under take to get it back and how long does it take? Most assuredly it's perishable. I do whatever I did to gain the skill to get it back. I try to focus on getting really, really good at the fundamentals. Everything else comes along with that. |
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I would say that it is perishable to a point.
With a proven rifle, ones skill will only diminish to a point. Meaning, you'll still know the mechanics, what to do, you've just not found your grove yet. Skill is perishable to a point. If you once had the skill, you'll always shoot better than someone with no skill. |
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How perishable it is depends on your peak skill level and how long the training gap is. Once you hit a certain skill level if you never touch a gun again you will nevertheless maintain a level of skill and capability that is far in excess of what any average person has, and with relatively little practice you can resume a level of performance that is close to the peak you developed during an intense period of training.
In other words, if you are a legit Tier 1 guy and you spend 15 years of your life training on small arms at their tempo you will ingrain an extremely high skill level. Ongoing training allows you to maintain an "edge" of absolute peak performance that can be delivered more or less on demand. If that person leaves the unit and doesn't touch a gun for 2 or three years, the level of skill he will be able to reproduce with the weapon will still be far above average even though it will probably not be as good as the performance he would have delivered during his time in the unit. As an example, I recently trained with a former Tier 1 guy who hadn't touched a handgun in a couple of years in a one day handgun course. Despite that, he proceeded to thoroughly spank most of us in the class who had fired a lot more rounds more recently than he did. His performance may not have been his absolute peak performance, but the performance he was able to deliver on demand was still better than most of us could touch. That's the benefit of his training. The same applies to competition shooters. I was in a class taught by Ernie Langdon recently. He is out of the firearms industry and doesn't shoot anywhere near as much as he did while he was in the USMC or working for the various gun companies and competing in games like IDPA. The Ernie I trained with would probably not be able to best the Ernie who won a bunch of IDPA titles in a match...nevertheless, he could still handily defeat any of us on the range with him at any time. One of the best shooters I know on his best day could maybe beat unpracticed Ernie on one of his worst. That's just how good Ernie is even if he's rusty. Think of firearms skill like a reservoir. When you train you are digging a bigger and bigger reservoir that can store skill. If you stop digging and adding to the reservoir, it goes static. Over time some of the water will evaporate and be lost...but the deeper your reservoir the more you'll have left when that happens. Top competition guys or guys who train like the Tier 1 dudes send a lot of rounds downrange to build skill. Then at a certain point they are mainly just honing their skills to keep them sharp. Then at another point they are really just refining them to keep a razor's edge. At that point if they stop, they will lose the razor sharpness they had at their peak. Those head shots on a moving target from the holster might come a little slower than they did at the peak. The reloads may be a tad slower and more clumsy. Their malfunction clearing may not look like poetry in motion...Etc. The less skill you have, the more rapidly it deteriorates and the less you are left with when it does. For most people, shooting is a VERY perishable skill set. If you were to take a newb through a 40 hour handgun course once a year, for example, and they didn't practice what they learned in the first course in the interim, you'd find that their skill level on day 1 of the second course would not be much above their skill level on day 1 of the previous course. |
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Quoted:
I would say that it is perishable to a point. With a proven rifle, ones skill will only diminish to a point. Meaning, you'll still know the mechanics, what to do, you've just not found your grove yet. Skill is perishable to a point. If you once had the skill, you'll always shoot better than someone with no skill. exactly. I think that once you get to a certain level you will never drop below the level of proficient. But you might not be competitive with someone who practices everyday. With long range marksman ship I would imagine knowing your dope is perishable. |