Do athletes solely train for one event or do they participate in multiple events?

[chaosking383]

Like is it common to focus on 10m pistols only or is it more common to participate in both 10m pistols and rifles as well as the other shooting events.

[Scrimshott]

I'm also curious about this. Personally, I would think passion doesn't discriminate much, but I would also have to acknowledge that spending time on other disciplines would make it hard to compete with anyone who spends all their time on one or the other. I don't know for sure though, that's just an educated guess.

[Ramon OP]

Most pistol shooters I know train and shoot multiple pistol events, but not rifle. Daniel Goberville used to compete in both, but only did international competitions with rifle.

I focus on precision 10m air pistol, followed by 50m and 25m events. 5*3 is my favorite rapid fire pistol event. I've recently started shooting rifle: 50m standing & benchrest, but this is more leisure and learning.

[JamesH]

Generally there's little overlap between pistol, rifle, shotgun.

[rgibson]

Almost all overlap occurs within rifle between platforms such as Smallbore and Air. I would imagine it is the same with pistol as in Air, Centerfire and Smallbore. Shotgun sports as well will have competitors shooting various disciplines i.e. Skeet, Trap, and Sporting Clays.
My Smallbore coach in high school said “you can do well here, as long as you are not shooting shotgun.” Even within rifle if you switch between Smallbore and Highpower there is a period of acclimation when going from a trigger measuring a few ounces to one that is weighed in pounds and back.

[KDZ]

Generally there's little overlap between pistol, rifle, shotgun.

I'm no Olympian (nor do I play one on TV), but I've found the hold and trigger training (dry fire, etc) to improve in target AP, .22, .45 has translated to improved rifle trigger and hold.

[JamesH]

Yes but its still very rare for athletes to really train across multiple disciplines.

[David M]

I train both precission and duelling (rapidfire stage).
This makes up about 7 match's with different calibres/pistols.
All a lot of fun.

[BobGee]

To the OP, the Swedish, seven times Olympian, Ragnar Skanaker used to shoot (well) in a variety of pistol disciplines. Though AP (1980 WC) and FP (50m) (GM 1972 Olympics, Swedish record of 583 = WR for Jin Jong-Oh) were/are his principle disciplines, he also set a record in Standard Pistol (1978 WC WR). When asked why he shot so many disciplines at comps he replied that as he had to travel a long way from Sweden to compete, it made sense to shoot them all so as not to waste the travel time.

So, participating in a number of disciplines is entirely possible, after all the fundamentals are the same. However, for most of us mere mortals, it is probably best to concentrate on one, or maybe two.

Bob

[JamesH]

The question was "is it common to focus on 10m pistols only or is it more common to participate in both 10m pistols and rifles as well as the other shooting events"
I've seen pretty well no overlap between pistol and rifle, or shotgun, although the fundamentals are the same.

Different pistol disciplines? Yes plenty, ISSF shooters dabble in larger calibre and vice versa.

That said I know someone who transitioned from pistol to shotgun, he was chastised for a smooth trigger pull "yank that trigger! get the shot off!"