[MrBorland]

Originally Posted by rdtompki

my thinking is that I shouldn't fire any faster than I can properly manage the trigger. I go into the matches telling myself "trigger control", but in the heat of the moment I loose focus being new to the sport. Any suggestions on an approach? Should I rapid fire and the trigger manipulation will just come with time?

To rapid fire without regard to trigger control and/or sight picture is to shoot out of control, aka a hosefest. It's a very bad way to shoot a match and, unfortunately, "control" will never "just come", as it's a very easy habit to adopt, but a very hard one to break.

Your original thinking was spot on. Always shoot within your control. A good rule of thumb is that the time added from points down shouldn't be much more than 10% of your raw time. Much beyond that, you're out of control. Get to this point, and it's a very slippery slope, so your final score very likely suffered as a result, even if it felt otherwise.

Staying within your control can be a very difficult thing to do at first, but as your results improve, the positive feedback will greatly help reinforce your controlled shooting.

EDIT:

Originally Posted by rdtompki

I'm seriously thinking about doing double taps on at least one string of each stage as a means of practicing for IDPA.

Normally I'd say it's a bad idea. A 2nd shot should only be taken when you actually know you need a 2nd shot. Planning ahead of time to take a makeup shot trains yourself to unnecessarily waste time and ammo and gives yourself permission to be visually sloppy. And because you've decided ahead of time to rip off 2 quickies, your 1st shot will likely be bad as well because you thought you couldn't miss with 2 shots. The truth is, 2 uncontrolled shots is far worse than a single controlled shot.

In your case, though, I understand this may be one of the few opportunities to practice double taps outside of matches. In this case, I strongly recommend making a commitment to yourself ahead of time that both rounds will hit steel and that you'll 1) only go as fast as you need to to get 2 hits and 2) you actually see both hits in real-time.