Marine Corp Training Manual

by **Founder** 8/22/2011, 10:01 pm

I have had in my possession for some time now a copy of the Marine Corp Training Manual. After the clinic in Beloit and all the emails about shooting groups on the Bullseye L List I got to thinking about that manual.

Sunday I headed to the range, lots of copied targets from the manual, lots of ammo and lots of time.

I was quite surprised how well the groups were on a piece of paper with the outline of a circle on it. Initially the drills seemed quite boring until I realized that I was sticking to my shot plan every time! My Mp3 player was loaded with range commands including a 2 second drill. My biggest problem (lately) had been getting the first shot off quickly and applying pressure to the trigger as the dot settled into the aiming area.

Being cursed with a solid hold and good trigger control, yes cursed! I want to hold the dot on the lower right leg of the X and squeeze my shot off. So recovery is slow, hold time to long and I get chicken finger from time to time, slow fire good sustained fire sucks!
200 rounds of 22 later and completing the training manual through the 22 TF portion my shots were breaking right at the horn (no turning targets) and 85% were in the X or tightly grouped on the paper. My timing improved dramatically, no chicken finger and if I caught myself holding for more than 2 seconds or attempting to actually aim I aborted the shot.

Then I shot at a 25 yard target, sustained fire until I hit a nine. 127 shots later I hit a nine and my arm was pretty tired. Good news is my wrist held up well!

So after refining my shot process, working the drills and pulling my head out of my arse. Sustained fire is a piece of cake! I should mention that I shoot timed fire at a rapid fire cadence, do not want to learn two different cadences - you know KISS!

My recommendation would be either join the Marines or go to brianzins.com and download the training manual. And after you download it actually use it! It took me three years to dust it off.

Starting my fourth year shooting Bullseye this manual has been the single most useful training I have used yet. It forced me to forget all the crap and let my finger do its job, pull the trigger uninterrupted straight to the rear as the dot settles (not settled) into the aiming area and make the gun go bang!

Simple!

Ok now I need to go dry fire for a bit.