Scatt training and trigger control

[Bret P]

Dear all,

I've managed to get a Scatt after selling the house and family. Great gadget and has already highlighted a main problem, assuming I have understood it correctly.

My aim is generally quite good as indicated by the cross, usually around the 10 area. But the shot tends to be away from the cross, low 9's or in the 8 ring. I assume this is poor trigger action.

I've tried to put a video and a picture into this question but have not been successful, not easy to do.

The question is; is this a correct interpretation of the SCATT and what exercises or drills can I do to improve triggering (so cross and shot overlap). Dry fire against a blank wall I've done and it looks steady, but there's a difference between Dry firing and with pellets. When I use the back of a card then the holes then become a distraction.

Any comments or thoughts welcome.

Kind regards
Bret

Nope can not upload anything via my phone on this site. Can upload to Instagram if the above make no sense.

[Gwhite]

Shots down at 7:00 (right handed shooter) are usually the result of forcing the shot off. As soon as you think about "firing the shot", you are in already in trouble. Concentrate on a steady ramp of increasing pressure on the trigger. As long as you are constantly increasing pressure, it WILL fire, but you won't know exactly when. Besides producing a clean release, this also helps eliminate issues where you tense up your grip in anticipation of the shot, which can also pulls shots down. The SCATT has shown you that you have a good hold. The trick is not to mess that up in getting the pistol to fire, or holding so long that your stability deteriorates.

The trigger pressure ramp doesn't have to be slow, and ideally, you want it as fast as possible without disturbing your sight alignment. Dry firing will help you find the fastest rate you can control well, and the SCATT timing plots will show you when in your hold you are in the "minimum wobble" period.

If you find the shots distracting, cut a hole in a target, just big enough that a shot that goes through it cleanly will be a 9 or better. Now, you have no score to worry about, and no holes to distract you. Once you can regularly shoot targets with no 8's, you can work on making the hole smaller.

[Bret P]

Thank you.
Will start on this straight away.

Best wishes

Bret

[thirdwheel]

Scatt is such a superb training aid and has opened up what you are doing, GW is spot on with his advice, I can add also make your follow through solid and focused as that will help to curtail zoomies when you do them, you will witness this on the scatt. A slimmer trigger blade also helps to get feedback to how the pressure is building so you know it is still building and not stalled, once you start squeezing you do not stop, if you need to stop squeezing as it is all going south reject the shot and reset and start again.
I've always used the older usb scatt but last week used a members camera based scatt on our sport Quantum targets during a coaching session, now that was interesting so not only did I have the Scatt screen on the computer I also had the real placement of the shot on the Quantum screen for feedback. I only use the usb scatt "dry" so it was good to see how the extra energy of the shot affected the outcome, looks like this energy adds to the zoomies if there is already big movement eg trigger zoomie and has minimal affect if it was a good release - you never stop learning! What was very interesting was watching follow through on different pistols and that the K12 recoil absorber works very well against the Steyr and how non absorber pistols reacted, the lack of a jump makes producing a meaningful follow through so much easier.

[Azmodan]

just to note on the "blank target" and "distracting holes" problem.. i have the same thing.
so i modified a paper mask (glued a white sheet of paper on it) and used white thermal paper -> to get a permanently white on white blank electronic target

[thirdwheel]

What a great ideal AZ, and yes gets around the holes putting you off, the SQ ET has a blank target to use but will try your idea with my freetarget at home.

[lwy.todd.lu]

Shots down at 7:00 (right handed shooter) are usually the result of forcing the shot off. As soon as you think about "firing the shot", you are in already in trouble. Concentrate on a steady ramp of increasing pressure on the trigger. As long as you are constantly increasing pressure, it WILL fire, but you won't know exactly when. Besides producing a clean release, this also helps eliminate issues where you tense up your grip in anticipation of the shot, which can also pulls shots down. The SCATT has shown you that you have a good hold. The trick is not to mess that up in getting the pistol to fire, or holding so long that your stability deteriorates.

The trigger pressure ramp doesn't have to be slow, and ideally, you want it as fast as possible without disturbing your sight alignment. Dry firing will help you find the fastest rate you can control well, and the SCATT timing plots will show you when in your hold you are in the "minimum wobble" period.

If you find the shots distracting, cut a hole in a target, just big enough that a shot that goes through it cleanly will be a 9 or better. Now, you have no score to worry about, and no holes to distract you. Once you can regularly shoot targets with no 8's, you can work on making the hole smaller.

Can learn a lot from this :-)
The trigger pressure ramp is what I’m training at the moment. But I found that sometimes the shot went off faster, some went off average fast, some slow, and some got trigger stuck. What caused the different? Gripping?

[Gwhite]

This is where dry firing is really helpful. Especially if the trigger gets "stuck". That usually means your brain is thinking things aren't "perfect enough" and is fighting the shot. Your finger pulls using "flexor" muscles/tendons, and it un-curls using "extensor" muscles/tendons. You want your trigger pull to use ONLY the flexor muscles. If your aren't fully "committed" to the shot, you can unconsciously tense up the extensor system. The trigger pull force that you feel is how hard your flexor system is pulling, but that can vary wildly if the extensors get in the act. This can cause the perceived trigger pull to go through the roof.

A couple things can help this:

1) Consciously completely relax ALL the muscles in your finger before your start applying pressure. You may be amazed at how light the trigger pull feels when nothing is fighting it.

2) The faster you can SMOOTHLY ramp up the pressure, the less time you have for your brain to kick in & mess things up. The coach of one of the best US "Bullseye" shooters (Brian Zins) used to tell him: No stinkin' thinkin'

3) Mentally approach the shot with a positive, determined attitude. Commit to the shot, without hesitation. To paraphrase Yoda: "Shoot or shoot not, there is no try.."

4) If you find yourself hesitating or your trigger "sticking," CANCEL the shot. You do NOT want to "practice" having your trigger pull compromised by getting the extensor muscles involved.

[thirdwheel]

What a gem of an explanation!!!

Thank you

[KDZ]

What a gem of an explanation!!!

Indeed. So good I printed it for my shooting file!

[lwy.todd.lu]

1) Consciously completely relax ALL the muscles in your finger before your start applying pressure. You may be amazed at how light the trigger pull feels when nothing is fighting it.

Oh~ That’s indeed what I had experienced sometimes. When I can use very minimum pressure on gripping, the trigger pull often very light. Sometimes too light which the fire went off before landing to aim area lol.

Thanks master, always~

[lwy.todd.lu]

Mr Gwhite has left a lot of gems on this forum. We can dig them out and make a book.

[Gwhite]

Thank you for the compliments! A book of coaching info is on my to-do list... I keep learning stuff, so it's kind of hard to say when I will slow down long enough to start organizing what I've written already and filling in the gaps.

Right now I'm finishing research on a manual for repairing Benelli Kite air pistols. In the process, I've discovered a lot about velocity testing pellets, and a few issues with Chinese chronographs that folks may find interesting/useful as well.

In the meantime, I need to start training for my annual lesson in humility, which is a free pistol match at the end of July.

[Ramon OP]

If you want I can help you with the book. I've already written 3 manuals :)

Just getting a basic structure will help you get started with writing.

Don't worry about having more knowledge coming, nowadays it is easy to update print if you do print on demand (all digital formats are even easier) and you can always share updates independently in a blog, website, or forums like thos one.

[Bret P]

This is where dry firing is really helpful. Especially if the trigger gets "stuck". That usually means your brain is thinking things aren't "perfect enough" and is fighting the shot. Your finger pulls using "flexor" muscles/tendons, and it un-curls using "extensor" muscles/tendons. You want your trigger pull to use ONLY the flexor muscles. If your aren't fully "committed" to the shot, you can unconsciously tense up the extensor system. The trigger pull force that you feel is how hard your flexor system is pulling, but that can vary wildly if the extensors get in the act. This can cause the perceived trigger pull to go through the roof.

A couple things can help this:

1) Consciously completely relax ALL the muscles in your finger before your start applying pressure. You may be amazed at how light the trigger pull feels when nothing is fighting it.

2) The faster you can SMOOTHLY ramp up the pressure, the less time you have for your brain to kick in & mess things up. The coach of one of the best US "Bullseye" shooters (Brian Zins) used to tell him: No stinkin' thinkin'

3) Mentally approach the shot with a positive, determined attitude. Commit to the shot, without hesitation. To paraphrase Yoda: "Shoot or shoot not, there is no try.."

4) If you find yourself hesitating or your trigger "sticking," CANCEL the shot. You do NOT want to "practice" having your trigger pull compromised by getting the extensor muscles involved.

Great explanation. Love the finger relax before and shoot or not shooting, there is no try.
Done my back in so hopefully in a few days, I'll be back on the wagon again.