Be Specific About Your Shooting Goals

Goals are very personal. How you look at things, how you name them, and the value you draw from them are also very personal things. In some of the emails I’ve gotten from the guys who are going to be on tonight, they’re all saying the same thing.

You need to research where you are, and where you want to be. Get the calendar out and begin to fill in the blank dates with shoots and travel times to and from tournaments.

How many regionals and how many local tournaments? Just how competitive do you want to be in master class? Do you want to be competitive in a zone? In a state? In the western United States, eastern United States, or anywhere you go? How many events at each tournament will you shoot? And how much rest are you going to need after you get there and between events?

You need to talk about the maximum number of targets you can shoot on each multi-day tournament. When do you need to be in bed? What do you need to eat? All of those things can be accomplished by simply filling out a logbook. And there’s a log page in the shot simulator that you can download.

Think about how many different places you will go to practice. People in Houston have a great advantage over many other people, because within an hour’s drive, there are five different shooting facilities. All of them have more than one course. So, if you’re in Houston, it’s easy for you to vary the backgrounds and vary the things that you’re doing. But if you’re in an area of the country where you’re isolated, you got to travel to get good targets.

How often will you go to the places to practice? Which place is going to give you the best bang for your buck as far as time spent there, diversified targets, etc.? When the weather sucks, you need to be practicing. You could practice in the wind, in the rain, early in the morning, and late in the evening.