Training With 50 Rounds A Week

The wife and I are looking to save some money in order to get into a house and eventually start a family... If you could only afford to train with 50 rounds a week, what type of training regimen would you do? I dry fire everyday for about 25 minutes and feel that dry fire is KEY to any successful regimen but I am looking for a structured range regimen in order to get the most value out of every round. Thanks!
 

Dr. Cornwallis

Regular Member
Dot Torture alternating weeks with B8’s at distance.

I would second that. I have both limited time and limited resources so I’m in a similar situation. I am a member of a range that will let me do whatever I want (including going full Chris Coastie rolling around on the ground and screaming weird shit) but it’s a 2 hour drive, so I’m only able to make it over there about twice a month. What I do is dry fire about three times a week and make it to the local indoor range to do slow fire on a B8 at 25. I work draws and reloads with my dry fire and then I make it to the outdoor range 1-2 times a month I work more advanced drills.

If you can only shoot once a month I would highly encourage you to do drills that work the fundamentals. www.pistol-training.com is an excellent resource for a lot of drills but, there’s a lot to be said about shooting at small things at 25 yards with a handgun.


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I would second that. I have both limited time and limited resources so I’m in a similar situation. I am a member of a range that will let me do whatever I want (including going full Chris Coastie rolling around on the ground and screaming weird shit) but it’s a 2 hour drive, so I’m only able to make it over there about twice a month. What I do is dry fire about three times a week and make it to the local indoor range to do slow fire on a B8 at 25. I work draws and reloads with my dry fire and then I make it to the outdoor range 1-2 times a month I work more advanced drills.

If you can only shoot once a month I would highly encourage you to do drills that work the fundamentals. www.pistol-training.com is an excellent resource for a lot of drills but, there’s a lot to be said about shooting at small things at 25 yards with a handgun.


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Getting to the range is a non issue for me fortunately. It's 10 minutes down the road and they let you do pretty much anything. Once a week with 50 rounds is now my live fire schedule.
 

PM07

Moderator
Staff member
Moderator
Clint Smith had a great article in SWAT a while back on getting the most out of training with only 50 rounds. It was draw, strong and weak hand drills and I dont remember what else. Try a google search
 

DanM

Newbie
If I only had 50 rounds per range session, most of my sessions would look like this:
Two strings of 5 rounds of 25y B8 slow fire or one 10 round string (10 rounds)
Some variation of the Super Test (30 rounds)
Justin Dyal’s Five Yard Roundup drill (10 rounds)

Once a month I would run the modified LAPD D Platoon Qual (50 round course of fire)

Every 6-8 week’s I’d run a 50 round dot torture or one of the variations with fewer rounds combined with some other drills for the remaining rounds.



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krax

Regular Member
I've always said that if I only had 50 rounds available, Dot Torture would be what I'd use it on. That said, if you've got 200 rounds a month, you've got options.

I'm all for training frequency, but every other week or even once a month isn't that bad if you're constrained on resources and are keeping up on your dry fire.

I'd say you have all the same drills available to you, but you can't afford garbage reps in any of them. You'll need to select drills and exercises that hold you accountable for every round fired and allow you to accurately gauge your proficiency.

Having been in situations where I had no range facilities available for extended periods of time and then going straight into quals or competition, I can honestly say that speed-focused practice is largely overrated for most folks. If you can clean Dot Torture at 5m and/or shoot a 85+ on a B8 at 25m, and you maintain a consistent dry fire regimen, you'll be able to achieve "practical" accuracy when you pick up the pace. It's a one-way street and it works out in your favor. Solid fundamentals can prepare you fairly well for USPSA events, actual shootings, etc., but blaze ops can't help you shoot 25m bulls.

I do think that a shot timer is worth having. If you don't already have one, they're a valuable enough tool that you could cut into your ammo budget to get one and still come out ahead in the long run. It's good to have a means of measuring your efficiency on the draw, target-to-target transitions, and reloads.

As for shooting fast, you can get away with a few Bill Drills, 26662, or even an El Pres. You'll just have to figure out what it is you intend to get out of those drills and cut yourself off at a predetermined point.
 
A trick I picked up from Paul Howe is to intersperse dry reps with your live ones. I don’t remember what his ratio was, but he did say that when he left the Army, 50 rounds was a good range trip for him.

If I’m working draws, I might do 5-10 dry on the range for every live round. Same for working bulls, or just about any other drill.
 

Zito

Newbie
Dot Torture is great, but it is a test, not an exercise for practice. There are far too many things going on and far too few reps to gain any real practice benefit from it. With such a limited ammo allotment I would suggest, as others have, making accuracy your primary focus with speed secondary, though you need some aspect of both in each session. It's simply too few rounds to work things like tracking to any great extent. B-8's at 25 are a good start. Any "gear-shift" style of exercise is also a great addition. Mike Seeklanders "X" drill would allow you variable target areas and force you to shift gears. Also, the AMU's 20 Alpha exercise would let you work variable distances. Something to keep in mind as well is you need to vary your practice. Don't always run the same drill the same way everytime you go to the range. Choose multiple exercises that focus on the same skill. With 50 rounds, 1-2 exercises is probably your max per session.
 

krax

Regular Member
Dot Torture is great, but it is a test, not an exercise for practice. There are far too many things going on and far too few reps to gain any real practice benefit from it.
I see what you're saying, but I have to disagree.

Dot Torture certainly could be used as a test, but it's commonly used as a warm-up and could function as a very general/shallow practice for pretty much every pistol skill category except for recoil control.

Shooting a B8 for score at 25 is a test, but it's also mindful practice.

There are 50 reps of pressing the trigger without disturbing the sights and 50 reps of tracking the sights through recoil. There's also a few draws and reloads. And there's no reason you couldn't get in some "bonus" reloads by loading just enough rounds for each dot drill, including a SHO and WHO reload.

The other drills/exercises you mention are good and I'll double down on my suggestion to visit the range less frequently so there's rounds available to practice different skills to the appropriate depth.
 

Zito

Newbie
I see what you're saying, but I have to disagree.

Dot Torture certainly could be used as a test, but it's commonly used as a warm-up and could function as a very general/shallow practice for pretty much every pistol skill category except for recoil control.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one. I understand your points, but I don't feel there is much benefit in running so few reps of so many skills. Shooting a particular skill 5 times is not enough to gain any reasonable amount of skill in my opinion. It becomes the "Jack of all trades" argument. Now, if you ran each string for 25 rounds, that may be a different story.

B8 for score absolutely can be a test, but that has more to do with how you use it. If you run 10rds on a B8 3 times, you are working the same skill, same sight picture, same trigger press, same focus 30 times. While dot torture does use thlet you use the same sight picture and trigger press for each rep, it has multiple skills with different focus's throughout. This is not very conducive to honing skill.

I'm right there with you with visiting the range less frequently to make more rounds available for meaningful practice. A 100 round range trip every two weeks may be more beneficial skill development wise than a 50 round trip every week. One last thing is you have to make shooting the gun the focus with such few rounds. Running something like 1-reload-1 or draw and fire 1 round every time you go to the range isn't going to help you out much. Those are skills that can be heavily developed in dry fire and then easily validated while working other skills in live fire.
 

krax

Regular Member
I wouldn't have a new shooter do Dot Torture and call it training for all the reasons you mention. But for someone with a decent base, I think it's a great warm up and diagnostic for the rest of the session, especially with quality dry fire in between.

Basically anything that lets you add up quality, mindful reps is a good thing once you've acquired the skills. For example, if a new shooter has a sloppy, inconsistent reload, the three reps he'd get with Dot Torture is no where near enough practice. But an experienced shooter is just solidifying that skill (I'm sure Malcolm Gladwell could explain that better, but you get it.).
 

Zito

Newbie
I wouldn't have a new shooter do Dot Torture and call it training for all the reasons you mention. But for someone with a decent base, I think it's a great warm up and diagnostic for the rest of the session, especially with quality dry fire in between.

I would agree with that.
 
This thread has a ton of great information! Thank you guys for the replies.

I dry fire 7 days a week for about 25 minutes a day. I've been trading ammo I don't use for 9mm so lately I've been able to do 100 rounds each week at the range.

I've been shooting various drills and police qualifications but instead of a standard IDPA or IPSC target or police silhouettes, I've been putting B8s and 3x5 index cards (when the qual calls for head shots) onto an IDPA target. I use the same par times that the qual calls for but I'm also forced to make my shots count. I also work in reloads, malfunctions, shooting from cover along with some low light work.

The accuracy B8 and 3x5 index card accuracy standards I use on top of the par times makes for a good 50-100 round training session in my opinion.
 

Zito

Newbie
This thread has a ton of great information! Thank you guys for the replies.

I dry fire 7 days a week for about 25 minutes a day. I've been trading ammo I don't use for 9mm so lately I've been able to do 100 rounds each week at the range.

I've been shooting various drills and police qualifications but instead of a standard IDPA or IPSC target or police silhouettes, I've been putting B8s and 3x5 index cards (when the qual calls for head shots) onto an IDPA target. I use the same par times that the qual calls for but I'm also forced to make my shots count. I also work in reloads, malfunctions, shooting from cover along with some low light work.

The accuracy B8 and 3x5 index card accuracy standards I use on top of the par times makes for a good 50-100 round training session in my opinion.

Great to hear!
 

Jeff22

Newbie
Here is a drill that Clint Smith recommended in American Handgunner back in 2006


Target: 18 x 30 inch cardboard. Primary zones are two 8-inch paper plates, aligned one above the other, and a 3x5 index card aligned above the plates. If using an IDPA or IPSC target as the backer, the 3x5 card is centered in the head. These simulate the three primary target zones on the human body, head, chest, and pelvis. The A-zone is the head, the B-zone is the chest, and the C-zone is the pelvis.


STAGE ONE: From the ready position, come on target and fire one round to the
B-zone. Remember proper follow through, and get a follow-up sight picture after the gun fires. Sight picture -- one shot -- sight picture. 6x total of 6 rounds.

STAGE TWO: From the ready position, engage each zone A-B-C with one round. Change the order with which you engage the zones and repeat. Focus on accuracy. 2x total of 6 rounds.

STAGE THREE: From the ready position, engage each zone A-B-C with two rounds. Perform a mandatory reload and engage each zone again with two rounds each. Change the order with which you engage the zones. Total of 12 rounds.

STAGE FOUR: From the ready position, engage the target in the center zone with one round. Repeat firing two rounds. Repeat firing three rounds. Total of 6 rounds.

STAGE FIVE: From the ready position, strong hand only engage the target in the center zone with one round. Repeat firing two rounds. Repeat firing three rounds. Perform a mandatory reload with both hands and switch the gun to weak hand only. Engage the target in the center zone with one round. Repeat firing two rounds. Repeat firing three rounds. Total of 12 rounds fired.

STAGE SIX: From the ready position, fire 4 rounds slow fire at the A-zone (head), perform a mandatory reload, and fire another 4 rounds slow fire at the A-zone.

TOTAL OF 50 ROUNDS FIRED

These exercises can be performed at 5,7 or 10 yards. An 8-1/2 x 11 inch sheet of paper can be used instead of the paper plates. Perform the drill the first time from the ready position, the second time from the holster and the third time from the holster with concealment. Increase the distance as your proficiency increases.
 
If you have a range or land that is available to use to go shooting a 22lr caliber semi-automatic carbine and handgun can be used to augment your shooting. The manual of arms may be different and you won't get recoil or feedback as a centerfire weapon. However you can still see what sort of grouping you can get, trigger control, and other things that can still help with your marksmanship.

You can find a brick of quality bulk 22 for the price of a couple boxes of handgun ammo.
 
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