For those of you who track your personal practice performances at the range, do you simply score shots on target as hits/misses or do you score the shots in zones with time penalties like IDPA, 3-Gun, etc? What do you feel are the pros and cons of each method? I’ve been scoring mine as either hits or misses, but am thinking about switching. Thanks for your thoughts on this!
Practice I track, kind of. I say that, because how I shoot practice differs somewhat from competition, at least mindset wise, sometimes because, like today, I was out there working different loads, and whatnot and wasn’t giving a huge care to everything else. Othertimes I am taking a step back, letting my reflexes take over, and looking for some things that need to be adjusted/observing. I don’t hold my practice runs to the same degrees of competitions and vis versa.
Practice is practice to me. I am looking at small thinking and thinking about stuff, shooting or otherwise. Competition, I want pure focus, I want my focus on teh target and the goal. The simple fact is that you cannot, I don’t care how you want to try, replicate the stress and pressure of competition, espcially when you are looking at winning/shoot off/money, or a two way range, on a practice course. May come close, may create certain aspects, but there is a difference plan and simple. You need to work on the stress, even as minute as some want to make it out to be, of competition by shooting it. I know a lot of guys who shoot great in practice, in actual competition, or when pressure is on, they choke. I can shoot good in practice, but have proven time and time again in competition and under high pressure I can still perform. Personal opinion it comes to mindset and being able to focus and push outside thoughts, and aspects from the mind.
Maybe I worded my question poorly or something. I just want to know how and why you and others score your targets during practice sessions when you are shooting drills and want to track your progression. Do you just count any shot outside of the X-ring, chest box, head box, etc. as a miss or do you score the shots in zones with time penalties similar to the way that competitive shooting targets are scored?
I work with minimally acceptable zones: 1" square, 3" circle, 3x5 card, 5x8 card, 6" circle, 8" circle, USPSA A-Zone, BCC Zone, etc.
I do minimal work with more traditional scoring targets, such as the B-8, but only for specific things, and even then I usually only score 8 and above.
Adding seconds for penalties is a gaming thing. For practical self defense shooting, those “seconds” are potential bystanders, etc. Drills typically call for all shots do be in a certain zone or require a certain number of points. In our scoring, if you do not make this requirement, the CoF is a no-go (fail) and time isn’t even a factor.
When I trained with the B-27, I placed one half of a 3"x5" card over the area where the eyes were located on the head and one half a sheet of 8-1/2"x11" piece of typing paper vertically on the center of the chest.
I train with targets that look like human figures now. I don’t count anything outside the spine box or circular area on the head of the attached target.
Thanks, guys. These are the kinds of replies I was hoping for. I’ve been logging and tracking my practice sessions for about a year now. I have been using TQ-19 targets for the majority of my practice and counting everything outside of the chest and head boxes as misses. After taking a Bob Vogel class and getting involved in some local IDPA matches I’m thinking about changing some things up next year and wanted to see what others are doing.
I don’t agree with that comparison, seeing as C and D zone hits are still on target, even though they are bad hits.
A scoring system is a scoring system, competition or otherwise. If you think competitors don’t care about accuracy, you are wrong.
Why do you not have a time standard in addition to accuracy standards? Accuracy without speed is just as useless as speed without accuracy…
William B:
My two cents, take it for what it is worth.
If you are going to score your sessions, score all hits as they register. Unless, of course, you are using specific geometric shapes as F2S mentioned. Then it is a hit or miss.
On an IPSC/USPSA target, and A is an A, a C a C and a D is a D
It is important to own every hit, just like it is important to acknowledge that you won’t shoot clean runs every single time. Unless you are extremely good, of course - or slow.
What you should do, however, is to strive to shoot to the highest accuracy possible. If using an IPSC/USPSA target, you should strive to shoot all A’s.
Also, if you are looking to measure you progression as a shooter, you should establish a few “core skills”, if you will. These are drills where you have established a par time, with the accuracy requirement always being A-zone hits.
Examples of these drills can be (par times are arbitrary, change as required):
Draw and shoot 1 shot:
7 yards - 1 sec
10 yards - 1,1 sec
15 yards - 1,2 sec
Draw and shoot 2 shots:
7 yards - 0,2 split
10 yards - 0,2 split
15 yards - 0,25 splt
Target transitions:
7 yards - 0,2 split
10 yards - 0,3 split
15 yards - 0,3 split
Mag change:
7 yards - 1sec
10 yards - 1,2 sec
15 yards - 1,4 sec
Bill drill:
7 yards - 2,0 sec
10 yards - 2,5 sec
15 yards - 3,0 sec
Again, these are just arbitrary numbers and examples of drills, but having a system like this enables you to measure progress and to develop a plan to reach the goals you have set for yourself.
For scoring and tracking performance, it is pretty simple - just use the Hit Factor system:
A=5 pts
C=3 pts
D=1 pts
HF = Points/time
So, for the Bill Drill above, the hit factor goal is 15 at 7 yards (6 A zone hits equal 30 pts / 2,0 sec = 15)
Again, strive for the best possible accuracy while gradually increasing your speed.
Arctic makes a good point, it comes down to application.
You can score anything however you want and use it to track progress.
There are a plethora of common drills out there (https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?16760-Favorite-Drills -funny, looks like pages 7-15 are missing…), each serving a purpose.
I tend to gravitate toward 100% accuracy requirements based on specific target sizes, and work on how fast I can get 100%.
This does not, however, give shooters in certain levels of progression the same speed growth that accepting B, C, and D hits does.
Take a look at drills and figure out which ones best evaluate your desired skills. They should note a target, but you are free to use whatever you prefer or have available.
Track your progress.
Now, I say this assuming that you have a shot timer. A shot timer is the single best thing that you can get for skillset tracking.
I see your point, and I think mine was a little unclear. This is going to drift over into training philosphy. I didn’t specify all hits must be A-zone. I said the area is specific to the task. This might be A -zone, it might be a 3 x 5 index card, in some cases, it is just “on target”. If you cannot achieve the task, the time doesn’t matter. I should also mention that I am not talking about skill building drills in this regard, but standards. Everyone is going to miss and throw shots while working to get better. If you don’t, you’re not pushing yourself. Standards (read: tests) must be stringent. The purpose of this is to give you an idea of where you ate training wise. If you cannot make all the hits one day, your goal next time is to shoot more accurately. If you shoot it clean and slow, you need to work on speed. It’s all a cycle. Shoot accurately, then up your speed, then push accuracy again. But if you start emphasizing time, and arbtrarily assigning a time penalty to misses, you begin to fall into the “combat accurate” fallacy. Consistent, precise, and incremental steps are the keys to long-term sustainable improvement.
Of course competitors work on accuracy, but only to the point that it prevents excessive time penalties. It’s a game and the goal is to get the best TIME possible. If you approach with too much emphasis on accuracy you turtle and lose. If you just hose everything, you could also lose. In competition, you must achieve a balance based on the arbitrary assignment of penalty time to bad shots. This is not the same balance as reality. I’m not ragging on gamers, but their balance of speed and accuracy is predicated on their sport, not neccisarily the reality of a fight.
The last thing I should mention is that I believe in soft standards. Your standard is shooting better than you did before. Hard standards breed complacency.
Edit: F2S just explained my first point much better than I did.
Tracking on Standards vs. Skill-building, and agree. You need consistency - skill is defined as consistent performance on demand. Skill is not “one-off’s”.
Not gonna all out agree on your statement on competition shooters though 
Most of the top guys shoot all the points they can. Case in point, Ben Stoeger won the USPSA Area 3 match recently, and out of 383 scored hits, he had 367 A’ and 16 C’s. No misses, penalties, no-shoots etc.
What they also have is consistency and efficiency. At that level, you can’t afford many mistakes.
Some say that in competition that you can shoot fast enough to miss - not true.
I shoot competition now, as a way to maintain skillset and own guns, and one of my biggest “flaws” with regards to improving at the sport is my focus on tight groups. I will beat myself up for what I consider bad shooting.
I always have a goal of 80% A’s, but even if I reach that goal, I am still upset if targets with 2 A’s show the hits far apart. One approach I use here is to use mini-targets for practice = smaller hit zone.
Case in point with Ben Stoeger, who shoots better on his worst day than I do on my best, is a self-admitted former turtle. He has also stated, I believe on a podcast or post discussing splits, that he would do better if he slowed down. But this is Ben Stoeger, and what he works on to get better is not what a B-class shooter needs to work on. People, as a whole, tend to chase the last 1% of performance from the 50th percentile.
At his level, EVERYTHING is critical. At the lower levels, I’ve seen hosers do better than they should. A lot of this is also stage design…
But I digress, this is a thread about scoring.
I, too, tend to be anal about accuracy, and I see a lot of hosing, not only in competition, but even in “tactical training”. It bugs me people they are essentially out-driving their headlights. They aren’t learning anything. If you shoot a sub 2-s bill drill and are getting all C hits, you aren’t good, you aren’t combat accurate, you’re an idiot at best, and a liabilty at worst. So why would you care that it’s 2 seconds. If you do, say, half a second additional for the C hits, that gives 5s. If you gave me that person, vs a person who could shoot a clean drill in the same time. I would take the person shooting clean, hell, even if they shot 6s clean. That is my reason for only counting clean runs for time.
There I go again.
I think it really comes down to this. Score the way that is beneficial to what your goals are. The real key is to be consistant so that you can track your progress.
I track whatever info I have available to me.
I wholeheartedly agree with this statement. Once you have established your goals and scoring system, using a shot timer is the most important thing you can do to gauge your progress and performance.
I should have asked sooner. What is the intent of your training and what are your goals? Are you trying to excel at competition or are your goals more defensive in nature? Once you establish your personal goals, choose a scoring system that works for your intended purpose and train to that end.
In regards to tracking, yes do it. Record data, keep it updated and focus on the intent. I always go for accuracy first, minimize errors and the speed thing always seems to work out for me in the end. Whenever I shoot or did shoot in competitions, I typically was never the fastest, but I would have the lowest if not zero errors and typically great accuracy and would either be on top or in the top 5.
I used to shoot IPSC, made it to a low A with 9mm, level three duty rig and a SW 5906 following the above approach.
Reference to the gaming of a stage, I made a chart with times, round count and hits(A/B/C/D). I would apply it to a stage and shoot it accordingly-a slightly different approach to my method, but as I mentioned–gaming. Low round count-accuracy, high-HIT IT FAST! Again, this is an exception, it was a game and I could separate the two as many others I knew and shot with.
Review your technique, shoot with a buddy or attend training. This will assist with identifying errors or inefficiency with technique which will help with speed as you become more fluid with motions and lesson errors. The other thing that has really helped me along the way is to trust your front sight. It’s your speedometer, know what you need to make a shot and let it go. In other words, reduce presentation time and set time, set time is relative to shot difficulty.
I’ve trained numerous people who’ve had real life application and saw the sunrise today.
This Gunfighter Moment by Mike Pannone sort of touches on this subject:
http://soldiersystems.net/2015/08/29/gunfighter-moment-mike-pannone-30/
Thanks for all of the great replies, guys. I was working on the road for a couple of days, so I just got a chance to sit down and thoroughly catch up on this thread.
So far, I have been using TQ-19 targets almost exclusively and counting anything outside of the chest or head boxes as misses. Maybe next year I need to mix it up a little bit by throwing in some IDPA or USPSA targets and using their scoring system every now and then. I do strive to own every round that I fire and, placing accuracy above speed, but once the accuracy is there I try to push my self to the point that I’m shooting accurately as fast as possible and gradually getting faster.
Definitely. I’ve been using a shot timer for about a year and a half now and it’s probably been more valuable in my growth as a shooter than most of the training classes that I’ve attended.
Thanks, Jack. I’ll take a look at that thread. Maybe changing up some of the drills that I’m tracking would be beneficial as well since I’ve been tracking the same drills for a year and a half. Right now I track my progress on drawstroke, 25yd slow-fire/accuracy, slidelock reloads, Bill Drills, and FAST Drills.
While I am just getting involved in some local competitive handgun matches, I still try to base all of my training, practice, and goals on the self-defense aspect of shooting. So maybe develop a personal scoring system that is kind of a more strict variation of the IDPA or USPSA scoring systems?
Thank you, Mark. What do you mean by “set time”? I don’t think I know that term.
Thanks. That was a good and well-timed read since I have been considering switching targets and possibly adding some “bad guy” or more anatomical targets to my routine.
Jack, I know you’ve been doing some big things in the competitive shooting world. Do you feel that your striving for 100% accuracy in practice has ever cost you in competition? Have you ever made a decision to sacrifice accuracy for speed in a competitive match? Being a more self-defense oriented shooter who is new to competitive shooting, I am still trying to work out the balance of doing well in matches vs. continuing to grow as a defensive-minded shooter. Thanks!
Set time, the time it takes you to make the actual shot. Relative to the difficulty of the shot, managing your sights and trigger accordingly. In other words, “how accurate do I need to be?” So if at 5 yards, trying to make a hit in let’s say an IDPA “A” zone, index the the front sight and work the trigger like a cheap “hoe” Same shot area at 25, treat the trigger like the wife and of course have a good sight picture.