Overhead going away - Being coached by Yoda

[Lloyd]

I was really struggling with the overhead going away target. I mean really struggling. As in, couldn’t break even just one. Even if you glued it to the muzzle!

I have a tendency to shoot swing through. Or rather the truth is more like I have a tendency to f@#% up pull away and have to rescue it with swing through. Occasionally, and I do mean occasionally, I f@#% up pull away and end up shooting maintained. Obviously, as I’m sure you can imagine, this doesn’t do a lot for consistency and I drop a lot of clays as a result.

So yesterday, I spent 4 hours under the tutelage of Ed Solomon’s focusing on Overhead Going Away for the most part. He had me doing this with maintained lead, which  took me a while to get to grips with. I kept missing underneath. Ed cured this with a ‘special motivational technique’ of which I am sworn to secrecy, but it worked. Well, it certainly did for me.

Still a lot of work to do on this target presentation though. 

We also worked on rabbits as I’ve had a drop off in capability there actually missing behind of all places, with a “dead gun”

Also worked on slow ‘floaty’ crossers, another target I’d been missing, habitually in front.

Working on these targets has actually helped me with other presentations also and my (informal) average has taken a good step in the right direction.

Working with Ed has yielded better results from a single session than perhaps all the other coaching sessions combined. 

One recent example was a coach “A” who was pretty determined to set me back to basics (was very keen to “see what these other coaches had been teaching you”) and spent the whole hour on Skeet looking at feet position.

Now I’m not in the least bit convinced of the value often placed feet position as you may well recall. I was asked by “A” to pick a kill point and put my feet at the 5 to 10 position (gun in my left shoulder). I deliberately broke the targets early and late with good clean breaks. This focus on foot position resulted in zero breaks from stand 1 high house on 1/4 choke.

With Ed, I was breaking the same skeet target, the breaks going from missing underneath to a dead center pulverised clay with 1/2 choke... feet position in my natural inclination of 5 past 10. Not once has Ed ever pulled me up on this (has pulled me up on plenty of other faults)

Sticking with one seemingly good “APSI/CPSA trained/medal winning coach” would I’m sure have yielded far poorer progress than had I not benchmarked by using multiple coaches in the last year.

Proof of the pudding is in the eating, not the recipe. 

Still have a massive amount to learn. The next steps are really consolidating on the progress I’ve made before moving on, which I think will be focusing on transitions between pairs.

View attachment IMG_0573.MOV

 

[JoostB]

Sometimes learning the basics well is very difficult, but will bring you further in the long run though. That doesn't mean that a coach should not appreciate a little bit eveyones own style.

 

[vmax1010]

Looking at your video I whoud have been looking much further back almost vertically to see the clay earlier and shoot it earlier with the gun just out of my shoulder 

 

[Lloyd]

Sometimes learning the basics well is very difficult, but will bring you further in the long run though. That doesn't mean that a coach should not appreciate a little bit eveyones own style.

Certainly Ed recognises that each individual will have certain natural tendencies. He may fine tune if it helps, or as in the case with the overhead going away, need to start from scratch, but tend not to focus on things which aren’t harming but aren’t text book.

The conversation with other coaches of foot position as been centred around comfort and body mechanics. “Start tight, unwind to relaxed “ or words similar. The thing is, My feet point 5 past 10 not 5 to 10 when I’m most relaxed, but neither would I even remotely describe my body as being tight at near 90 degrees clockwise or near 180 degrees counterclockwise and I have broken targets close to those extremes on occasion, though I certainly didn’t plan to nor would I make a habit of it.

Im all for learning text book methods, and whilst my experience may not always align, I’ll always give it a try, even if I’m skeptical 

Looking at your video I whoud have been looking much further back almost vertically to see the clay earlier and shoot it earlier with the gun just out of my shoulder 

Ed was actively pushing my hold point later whilst getting me to look further and further back. I think for me he’s giving me more time to mentally and visually connect with the targets. Perhaps as I progress, I’ll be learning to shoot them earlier? I was certainly getting a little quicker shot by shot on the skeet #1 high house and got some good clean breaks towards the end.

This is still a weak area though much improved. There’s still a lot to do if I’m going to get even close to my goal.

 

[Bebo]

Ed is really good at working with the way you already shoot rather than changing your technique completely. He also helps you develop different ways of dealing with certain targets. For example, I have a tendency to stop the gun on very slow floaty targets that need little / no lead if I shoot maintained. We tried a few different ways and worked out I was going to be most consistent tracking behind the target and then very slightly increasing my gun speed  as I came to the kill point to get the lead I need (often just front edge). Stops me stopping the gun and is very repeatable.

His maintained method on overheads doesn't work for me, unless they are high and relatively slow. Flat, fast ones I effectively swing through. Let the clay get below the barrel and push the gun down to the target. Only works because I shoot both eyes open and don't lose sight of the target.

 

[Lloyd]

@Bebo I think the differences between the way you describe how you shoot and how I  shoot those same target types illustrate exactly your point and the point I’m trying to make also.

I have a habit of too much gun speed, but Ed has helped my get more control over a wider range of gun speeds, more suited to the speed of the clay.

On the overhead, I was trying swing through under my own steam and it just wasn’t working at all. I was reasonably consistent, but consistently about half a meter or so underneath. Actually I don’t see “meters” at the clay, but rather millimetres at the muzzle, even though the muzzle isn’t actually in focus.

The maintained method was much more repeatable for me and I was actually shooting the top edge with what feels like a near stationary gun for a good kill.

I was quite taken aback by the sight picture I need on the slow floaty ones. I was shooting right at them and missing in front. 
by slowing the gun speed to what feels like a crawl and shooting the back edge, I was nailing them.

This has made me think about the mass of the gun and perhaps me coming to terms with eating yet more humble pie

every day is a learning day.