I don't think there is a rule that will define when it becomes comfortable. I think your best course of action would probably be to play the song all the way through from beginning to end starting slow and working up to tempo when you have removed all of the kinks at the slower pace.

When you can play it up to tempo all the way through without mistakes, start doing repetitions until it is second nature. If there is any doubt in your mind that you don't have it completely nailed, then you probably don't. New grooves/techniques take time to become "part of the toolbox."

I think this question underscores the quote (shamelessly plagerized from a unknown source) "an amatuer practices until they get it right, a professional practices so as to never get it wrong". 

Though clearly an amatuer, I try to rehurse and practice like a pro since I am gigging out more and more. Sometimes I even just sit and think about, and sing the groove until i am comfortable in what I should even practice.  Playing out, I rarely ever "go for a new groove" unless it is either a very forgiving (and drunk) audience, or it has become second nature through a lot of practice (weeks to months).

Your time to "second nature" will vary...no reason or need to put a time limit on it. Just adopt the attitude of practicing to never get it wrong.

keep at it...some days your the stick, some days your the head.  Bob

I think at least a couple of twenty minute sessions per song would be good.
It isn't the length of time at a single sitting that counts though.
You could practice a song ten minutes a day for a week and play it better than if you practiced it for one hour on one day.

Yeah, but it isn't about studies on motor control.
Sorry, excuse me for being the dry, curmudgeonly drummer here.

It's just about playing the drums (often with other people) enough to feel comfortable behind the kit.
It's just a matter of time put in.
But the key is to not get ahead of yourself.
If you are practising semi-advanced stuff with your hands, but you can't play simple drum grooves, it's time to go back to practising the simple drum grooves.

To me, any groove that's on a record is probably right.
It's just a case of persevering with it to make it feel right.

Hey, whip them into line! 

I see your point completely.
In the case of 'Love The Lord', I'm not sure if I could come up with a different groove (except for the tom section).

Hey, old man, think outside the box!!!   I'm actually older than you, which means I've progressed beyond curmudgeonhood to old-farthood.

In one sense, practice IS memorizing motor control.  What I'm trying to zero in on isn't whether or not I should practice something, it's how and what should be practiced in order to learn/internalize something in the most efficient manner possible.  The brute-force method of spending hours/days nailing something down is fairly common...I've done that myself both for drumset and marimba.  But I'm a little suspicious of this being an "efficient" method.  It's just the method we know (and love).

To put this in context, this last weekend had a yet another new song with yet another simple groove that wasn't one that I would just sit down and play on my own.  (Personally, I thought something else would have been just as good/better, but I wanted to do it the way it was recorded.)  This time, instead of spending 20 plus minutes at one time on the groove, I did four 5 minute sessions.  In between the 5 minutes, I wandered off and did something non-drum related...eg surf the web, scrounge in the pantry for something to eat, pester my wife, etc.  I also made sure one of the 5 minute sessions was practiced at a significantly faster tempo than what the music/recording indicated.  I think this method was more effective in memorizing/internalizing the groove (for me at least), but obviously chewed up more calendar time.

As someone mentioned, one or more of the other musicians doing something significantly different rhythmically than what's on the recording can really knot things up.  The conflicting/competing bass lines on Sunday morning I mentioned in another thread is an example of this.  The Saturday group has a number of bass players with various degrees of ability/experience that rotate in and out.  I usually don't know which one it will be until Saturday afternoon and there's typically not enough time to sort out anything other than major issues. 

If I have to play something different than what was recorded to help things lock up and gel, so be it.  But, if everything is happening, I want to make sure I can trot out the recorded groove and use it.  Upon reflection, I probably punt too soon instead of giving the recorded groove enough time to work...we may all be reacting to each other too quickly and are spiraling into the lowest common denominator as we try to bring the song together.

I guess its a matter of economics, but professional athletes/teams spend big bucks on people who understand how the body moves to teach them how to do things efficiently.  These trainers may not actually play the sport or have near the talent of the people they're training.  I have not yet run across any similar kinesiology type stuff in music/percussion with the JoJo Mayer DVD perhaps being an exception.  Ditto for understanding how the brain works and memorizes stuff.

The science of practice.  Sounds like there's a PhD in there for somebody...

--David

For me "owning it" typically occurs more with calendar time than hours per day time.  My drum set gig is weekly Church playing.  For all but the most challenging tunes, we can work them up in an hour or so during rehearsal and do well on Sunday.  The harder tunes take a few weeks' rehearsals to get it down.  Mind you, I go in w/out a scrap of paper to help me either.  It's all in my noodle as it were.  (I don't like to have to refer to jotted notes to get through tunes.  I get the framework memorized and play within it.) 

In the pipeband world, it's a much longer process.  We have to first just be able to execute the notes while looking at the music, then play the music while looking at the music.  Then we need to memorize it, and only then can we do multitudes of repetition towards owning it for competition purposes.  All in all, I'd say it takes me 4-6 months to be comfortable competing a set, and upwards of a year before I can play it totally automatic, i.e., consistently no flaws, even when distracted while playing it. 

Wow.
I'm sorry.
I gather your experiences are like mine. No one takes the drummer's opinion seriously.
It's always worth saying something though.
It may be the church band has never considered it important to nail some of the songs. they might just change their mind.

Absolutely.  Before working specifically on the newish groove last week, I ran through a rotating variation of it.  The target groove was hi-hat 8th notes, snare on 2 and 4, and the kick was on 1 with the interesting bit as two 16ths on the e and + of 3 like this:

1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
K        KK

As I recall, this kick pattern showed up with the second verse and only lasted for that verse and maybe a pre-chorus/chorus...I've slept since Sunday.  There was also something occasionally going on with the hi-hat, but I couldn't quite make out what the drummer was doing.  The song was God of This City (Tomlin/Passion) for the curious.

The rotating scheme I did was a 16th pair at each position within the measure--I played each about 16 times.  So 1e for 16 measures, then e+ for 16 measures, then +a for 16 measures, then a2 for 16 measures and so on.  HH 8th notes and 2/4 snare for all of them.  Metronome as always.

What was fascinating as I shifted the 16th pair was how much the groove jumped around between really comfortable/musical, eh, and ooh--I need to practice that one.  Equally interesting, were ones I thought might be problematic really weren't and some that probably should be mastered at this point in my life felt awkward (like the one I wanted ).  Obviously, tempo can drive what feels comfortable/clumsy, but running it at a slow 75 bpm was enough to show strength/weakness in my right foot's ability.

This is a partial answer to my quest...what do I need to be practicing in order to expand my toolbox / vocabulary.  The other part is to figure out the most efficient method of practice to make this happen.

--David

Cool, I've never noticed the spell check button before...when was that added?