Day 5. Shooter as student

Jumping ahead to day 5, "center fire" day. Centerfire is 90 shots with handguns chambered for .32 to .45 caliber. I shoot .45 in both centerfire and .45.

I was disappointed with my scores from .22 day, and really wanted to improve with my .45. Sadly, slow fire remained a problem, with a high of 70/100 and an aggregate of 670/900. I left the range still very disappointed. I'm frustrated that after 5 years of playing this game off and on, I'm still not progressing at all. I'm still a "marksman", the lowest classification.

I headed to the team match and offered to be the one shooter sitting out for the day, because I had too much "bad juju" to shoot for the team. My captain didn't seem too thrilled, but it saved him deciding two would sit out. Two of our team members had awful matches and we scored poorly. Big bummer day.

My bad mood stayed, until sometime in the evening when it hit me, that my mental moping sounded a lot like my students. I could hear "but Dr. A, I read the book and I understand lecture, why am I getting an Cs on the exam?". My answer is always "Are you working the problems? The exams are like the book problems. You've got to practice what you're going to be expected to play."

I've read the classic books on bullseye shooting and attended some incredible clinics, but my actual practice of shooting has been inconsistent. Between work, life, ranges being farther away, lack of money etc, I've just not "worked the problems" of the sport since I left Colorado. My scores are in the 70% area; I'm getting a C in shooting.

So I start the last day of Perry with the goals of a solid marksman score, positive self talk and having fun. Soon I need to figure out how important this is to me, and how much time I'm willing and able to put in to improving. Between long distance caregiving and the last year on the tenure track, I will likely be a marksman for another year or so, and I need to be OK with that.

On a totally different note, I scored one of the Army Marksmanship Unit teams, I think it's actually their top team. They're amazing to watch.