Arizona Bigs

 The knock against blocker targets among CFDA shooters is that they ruin your draw for professional events.  Many of the good shooters in the valley of the sun refuse to shoot blockers for that reason. However, blockers can be beneficial for training if you have the proper focus. The advantages can be that:

 1. Because of the large size you see the actual hit of most of your shots.  If you see the actual hit, your mind and body will adjust your draw to bring the shots onto the center of the target.  A shooter that is hitting 30% on a small target is wasting 70% of his wax, his effort and his time.  Why not hit 100% and get the benefit of the subconscious moving the hits to the light.

2.  Because of the large size of the target, some of the stress of trying to hit the target is removed.  When we shoot up close at 5 feet and then move back to 15 feet, our times are always much slower than what is accounted for by the distance.  The additional time results from the stress of trying to hit the target.  Larger targets remove some of this additional stress.

ARIZONA BIGS:  The target is a standard 24 inch CFDA target with a 10 inch black circle in the middle.  We initially painted the outer circle grey which did not work well.  We are experimenting with red or green.  The grey color did not allow the shooter to see the hits which is the whole point of the target.  If the shooter hits "in the black" the time is divided by 2.  If he hits in the outer circle he gets  that time. 

The target is designed to be shot at 10 feet but we probably will be shooting it at 15 feet.  At 10 feet target height is 44 5/16 based on the CFDA's calculation of standard muzzle height of 39".  At 15 feet target height would be 47".  Shooters would benefit more at 10 feet because higher hit percentage, but there seems to be some resistances to that distance so we will try it at 15.

Poster Shooter:  At our first test Holli Day hit 93% of 14 shots, her first shot being .375 and her final shot being .348.  Her final 5 shots were all "in the black" and were all within a 3 inch circle.  The speed was not remarkable, but the  consistency was.  She got better and better, quicker and more accurate.  That is the point of the target.  The goal is to finalize your draw and to walk your hits to the light.

"We don't practice missing and we don't lollygag." Alleluia Ruah