The verge of a breakthrough

I'm on the verge of a breakthrough with my pistolcraft; I can feel it.

I was at the range yesterday with my trusty Buckmark .22 pistol, and was doing alright, but not nearly as well as I'd done in the past.

I tried to remember what I did differently, and it struck me. I adjusted my grip, and shot off 10 rounds at 50 feet. It felt uncomfortable, I needed to readjust a few times, and I had little idea of how well or poorly I had done.

When the paper plate was close enough for me to see, I was dumbstruck. Well, not dumbstruck exactly; I did say, "You've got to be fucking kidding me."

I had a wide three leaf clover, with one shot right in the middle of the three. The remaining 6 shots fell randomly around the group, but the impression was made.

For those four shots, I did everything perfectly. I futzed with my grip and position while shooting, so I can't tell if the good group was from shots made while uncomfortably in position, or in a slightly looser position. Either way, I'm getting better.

After a bit, I hung a tennis ball, and kept putting it further out. Locking my shoulders, and moving my eye with the front sight made tracking the swinging target much easier, but the front sight was black against the black backstop, necessitating true lock up on eye/front/rear sight alignment, because in order to confirm my sights were aligned, I'd have to aim at the white of the roof, or a neighbor's target. I wanted to develop that "feel" for my firearm that I had developed with my paintball marker.

Where you look at your target, and think about hitting it, and it is hit.

Practice, practice, practice.