TWO COACH’S FACILITIES & DRILLS

In this journey we will look at the training facilities and coaching drills of two clay target champions — Will Fennell and Gebben Miles. Both professional shooters not only continue to grow their own game and coach but have private facilities where they coach on a regular basis. While continuing to coach on the road, Gebben shares details of the growth at his home training facility, River Bush Farms. Will also continues coaching on the road and shares with us the exciting growth of his own venture, Fennell Shooting School in Sharon, South Carolina. Will and his wife, NSCA Level III instructor Elizabeth Lanier, continue to devote themselves to excellence at Fennell Shooting School.

n Tell us about your shooting

This is a private shooting facility, therefore that is why the address is not actually on the site. When shooters set up a lesson, an automated Google maps response, along with a questionnaire, is provided. Prior to any new coaching session, we will reach out to the client and inquire about their needs, such as rental guns, ammo, etcetera. We have two primary shooting areas onsite. A classroom for whiteboard work when needed and another building for gun work. We also have a large pattern plate for testing chokes, barrel regulation, point of impact and pattern efficiency. Our twenty-fourfoot tower, on top of a nice hill, allows for excellent target presentations. We have pretty much every specialty target you could desire, and all this is provided by our partners MEC and Long Range Systems. It is the perfect environment for grinding out specific targets and doing drill work. Shooters should know they are training where many members of Team USA train, Fennell Shooting School. Basically, there is 360 degrees of shooting terrain. Our newest addition on the property is a fourteenfoot platform over a ravine that gives us the ability to shoot twenty-five feet below our feet.

n Along with this facility, where

Currently my wife and I are coaching at Kiawah Island, therefore we are in Charleston, South Carolina quite a bit and at Rocky Creek from time to time — especially when we are doing a lesson on a course with a client on how to play/manage the game. I also coach in the Atlanta metropolitan area. I have been going there since the early 2000s. Recently I have decided to get back on the road coaching a bit. I currently coach in Katy, Texas at Westside Sporting Grounds four times a year. I would like to mention I do try to partner with subject matter experts. Jim Greenwood, Henry Hopking, Dr. Colo and Dan Carlisle are just a few I have partnered with as of late. I try to think of our school here in South Carolina as a trusted partnership with others that can add benefit to our students. I got the impetus to do this after visiting Roundwood Shooting School in England.

n What has been your biggest

The realization that I had enough experience after being coached and shooting as much as I had that I could now tell what someone was doing wrong in his or her mechanics and technique. In addition, I started to understand what a student was thinking when he or she did something wrong. The impact this had on me was huge. When you tap that shooter on the shoulder and say, “you measured didn’t you?”, and the look in the students’ eyes knowing you are right, after once or twice you now have the student’s attention. I would also say working with Dr. Colo and understanding what is actually going on with eye dominance and why, has also been monumental.

n You are sending a student

To start off there are different drills for missed opportunities. One of the things I emphasize over and over again, is when you break down scores 75-80% of most courses are under 30 yards. I like to assign this locally at Rocky Creek. I like shooters to go shoot me a 95 on the easy course before I hear more about what they want to work on next. Just like in golf they worry about the drive but can’t putt worth a dang.

We have a drill for the following: the second shot of a true pair that has a fast crosser you have to shoot first, and a second target that is an off-speed floater. We are trying to teach control here. So often a shooter will just rip through this second target, and never sync with the target. To address this, we will have a student mount on a clay target machine where a target is crossing or even deep quartering. They then call for the target, rather than race through the target and pull the trigger, they will race to the front edge of the target and learn to control their movement from the front side, hanging on to the target. This teaches a shooter not to panic fire.

n Tell us about your shooting

Sure, our facility is by appointment only. We have 30 clay target machines provided by Laporte. We can offer any target presentation a shooter could want. In fact, we have two towers on site, one sixty and one eighty feet tall. Both have two machines, each with robot remote capability to change whenever needed. Our grounds are extremely versatile. We have a shooting environment with 360 degrees of capability. Mobile shade cover is available for when temps get inhospitable. Finally, we have a classroom area on site when needed. We conduct both clinics and one-on-one sessions.

n Along with this facility where

I coach at other clubs in Arizona such as Tucson Trap and Skeet, along with the clubs in the Scottsdale/Phoenix area. However, I do not have a specific rotation. Some clubs I coach at regularly are Northbrook Sports Club in Illinois and many of the clubs in Florida. Typically, after any major event I attend, I try to stay and coach at a facility or a club in that area. I will also book coaching engagements and travel to accommodate those bookings.

n What has been your biggest

I would say that the biggest “Aha” of understanding came when I realized high level performance is just a high-level application of the basics. That there really is not a secret, per se, for shooters at the top. It is just truly high-level application of fundamentals and principals. Every shooter just understands this at a different depth. Shooters are typically looking for that piece of

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information. That magic answer to break through. Breaking through comes from hard work and perfecting the fundamentals through training and competing.

n You are sending a student

If someone is typically in this scenario, they are dropping one or two at a station. Maybe the last pair on a station often in tournaments. I would have that type of shooter work on what I call consistency practice. Work on running stations but give goals to do this proficiently and

often. So here how it goes. Go to your course, shoot that first station until you run it. Next add a station and run it. If you don’t, you have to go all the way back to the beginning. Then, if you run it add a station. For example, accomplished shooter Trevor Jensen and I would do this in FITASC and work on running pegs. I would say “Hey, let’s run two pegs in a row, then three, then so on and so forth.” It helped him get comfortable with running 25 straight. Being comfortable executing under pressure will ultimately help in tournament performance. n