TargetTalk

CraigE wrote: ..... playing a musical instrument.

Craig, I really like your analogy to playing a musical instrument. So I started thinking about 'sitting down to play my gun, instead of my piano'. One issue immediately presented itself - there is no 10 in music. What I mean is that there are differences between a well executed piece of music from player A compared to a well executed piece from player B. That is what distinguishes Perlman from Heifetz. But in shooting, artistic variation is not allowed - we want the subconscious execution to result in a 10, whether the shooter is me or you. So, I wonder if we are asking too much of the subconscious? Or if not, it is not at all clear to me how to get from my present state to Ed's vison.

Am I making any sense?

Fred

I think it's important to recognize that the conscious and subconscious are inseparably intertwined in everything you do. There's a tendency to separate the two, and I see that on some of the comments here, but thinking that way is a mistake IMO. Since we are by definition not consciously aware of the subconscious, we are tempted to separate it from our conscious -- but both are always present. Every physical action you perform is ultimately done by your subconsious, at the request of your conscious, whether that is tying your shoes or driving your car or firing your gun. When you learned to tie your shoes as a child, what part of you was learning to do it? At first, tying a shoelace needed to be done with concentrated conscious control over each little step. With repetition, your subconscious learned how to do it without you having to remind it of each step. Today, you probably tie your shoelaces without even knowing how you do it. (And, by the way, there is no basic positive reinforcement like food required for your subconsious to learn to tie your shoes, or do a million other actions.)

I couldn't touch-type this message without my subconscious having learned how to type. It operates my fingers rapidly on the keyboard, under my conscious direction, but without me having to direct its every action. I used to have to do that when I first tried to type.

Think about this for a minute: you couldn't read and understand this the way you do without your subconscious. When you learned to read -- and before that when you learned to speak -- what part of your mind learned language? What part of your mind is actually able to read this so quickly? Not your conscious. It is receiving these words from your subconscious, which scans the text, interprets the shapes, and passes them on to you instantly as the words you understand in your conscious. I would venture to say that you couldn't speak or even think without your subconscious. You cannot separate the two, even though you are unaware of the subconscious.

The subconsious is very emotional. It is much, much, much faster than your conscious mind. It can throw a shot away with a tiny muscle twitch that you don't even experience consciously. Or it can make a ten happen when it would have been an eight. It is remarkable. It is always listening. If you ask to to shoot a ten in the right way, it will do so. The hard part for me is that I am always struggling to get it to understand what I want it to do. You can't just talk to it. My self-image, calmness, focus, concentration, trust -- these are all so important in communicating with the subconscious, and I have a tough time controlling them.

I love trying, though. It's what keeps me shooting.

This topic reminded me of a thought-provoking phone conversation I had with Don Nygord in 1997. I just dug out my notes (yes, what Don had to say was so interesting that I wrote down notes afterwards!). In summary, he thought that the shooter's state of mind was very similar to the artist's state of mind, as described in the book, "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain," by Betty Edwards.

Of course I bought the book and read it (and I highly recommend it). What's important for this discussion is the conceptual model of the way we think and act, that is the basis of the book. Again in summary, Edwards recognizes two modes of perception/thought: L-Mode and R-Mode, standing for left brain and right brain. Probably most of us are familiar with the concept of left brain activity (analytical, language-oriented) compared to right brain activity (imagery, non-verbal). But she points out that you don't have to accept the left-brain/right-brain concept literally, in order to recognize that humans seem to have two different modes of perception. She believes that drawing - indeed all creative activity - comes from the R-Mode, and Don felt that the R-Mode was where we want to be when target shooting.

What I've realized as this thread progressed, is that everyone is talking about a hierarchical relationship between conscious and sub-conscious (or whatever word you want to use) thought. How many times has it been written above that the conscious must tell the subconscious what to do? But Edwards, and presumably Don, are talking about a parallel relationship. In other words, to perform in R-Mode, you do NOT have to get instructions/orders from L-Mode. In fact, although they are both part of your brain, they don't communicate all that directly. And it's quite possible that the desire for something is neither R-Mode nor L-Mode, neither conscious nor sub-conscious. The main thing is, that the two modes perceive the world differently, and from those different perceptions come their different abilities.

Don said that when he shot, he could enter this state of mind at will, and that shooting was very easy in this state of mind. I would love to be able to do that, but it comes to me only in tiny flashes, certainly not at will. But I would like to suggest that the hierarchical model inherently makes shooting difficult, even though it lends itself much more readily to coaching and discussion. I wonder if it isn't like electricity: series (hierarchical) = greater resistance; parallel = less resistance ;-) Remember that all the theories we are discussing are arbitrary, abstract constructs; there is no concrete, discrete "conscious" or "sub-conscious" in the brain. Wouldn't it make sense, then, to choose a construct that makes things easier?

FredB

During the course of all of the normal, standard training and practice routines strive for improvement. Focus on anything that yields any improvement and ignore anything that does not work as well. If a bad shot happens, don’t make a big deal out of it. It is not failure, simply try again. When something good happens think about it, let your self be happy, stare at the good shot with the scope and rejoice. No need to dance and shout, just make it positive. The smallest hint of a smile is enough to communicate that this is what you like. If you shoot a poor shot do not stomp on the floor or even do something as insignificant as telling your self that was a bad shot, just ignore it as best as you can and move on to the next good shot. The ability to have a poor shot without any emotion of any kind is of the utmost importance. Bad shots don’t count.

I have repeated the same thing over and over because it is just that simple.

Visualization was not mentioned because we have already covered that in detail.
Visualization and what you visualize is very important.

I hope that new perspectives and the input of other shooters can clear the muddy waters enough that all will drink.

Bob Fleming

Perhaps trying to find the sub-c for this shooting thing is more a matter of supressing the conscious. Do so and the sub-c will be there. So to speak.
Proper preparations and elimination of all distractions, even if it is say 'tired feet'. I need to hone my physical steps for the shot so they do not dwell at all in the conscious mind during the shot. Distractions and doubts, they gotta go.
Jack H

The biggest key to shooting is what happens when the shot breaks. There are several types of breaks that a shooter can attempt:

1. The complete surprise break. Neither the conscious or subconscious mind knows when the gun is going to go off. This is usually accomplished by applying the pressure to the trigger so smoothly that the timing of the break is unpredictable. The big advantage of the complete surprise break is that the subconscious is unable to mess up the shot by a rapid muscle twitch that throws off the front sight. The disadvantage is that the shot will only fall within the natural wobble of the shooter. In order to shoot all tens, you either need an incredibly steady hand or luck. It can result in very good groups and very good shooting, though. I just don't believe I could personally ever shoot 100 this way without luck.

2. The conscious break. No suprise; you consciously control when the gun goes off by a rapid stab at the trigger. I call this "now-ing" the shot. This is how beginners will tend to shoot because their subconscious is not yet trained to take over the process, and it is also what happens when more experienced shooters anticipate the shot, and force it. The results are seldom pretty. The subconscious still controls your physical body, and will either know that your forcing of the shot is wrong (it's not going to achieve the result because it's too late by the time your conscious gives the command), or it will flinch in anticipation. The physical act of jamming the trigger hard is also much more likely to disturb the shot.

3. The subconscious break, or to phrase it another way, the conscious surprise break. The conscious mind is surprised by the shot, but the subconscious is not. This is what we're talking about here. When it works, you get a "controlled ten" -- that shot where you know it's a ten without even scoping it, and it's a ten because you made it a ten, not because the shot just happened to break at the right time. It's a wonderful feeling, but speaking for myself it's very difficult to achieve every time. It requires a zen-like mixture of conscious and subconscious, with the conscious guiding and supporting the subconscious to achieve the goal. It means a positive self-image, trust, calmness and focus on the task but without pressure.

OK. As I have thought about it and read the responses, I agree that we learn to type and tie shoes without the instinctive pain/pleasure incentives, so clearly it is possible for the subconscious to learn based on more abstract cost/benefits.

I guess one of the challenges we have in Air, Free, Standard pistol and Bullseye shooting is that we shoot too slowly. In Rapid Fire and IPSC things happen so fast there is no possibility of doing them consciously. Only the subconscious can fire more than 1 shot every second or two.

Ed, I think I get what you are saying, but I don't know how to get to that state. My current shot process is what you describe - Consciously raise, align, settle then 'authorize' the subconscious to pull the trigger. I have no doubt that the subconscious can perform these activities. I also have no doubt that I am missing the first 1 or 2 opportunities for a 10 waiting for the conscious authorization.

Now I am struggling with how to get my conscious out of it. Some thoughts off the top of my head...

1. Consciously saying "ok, you are in control" before raising the pistol. I wonder if it is enough. The control freak in me says "it can't be that easy" but experience has shown that many things relating to the subconscious really are easy once you make the commitment. Specifically I am thinking about breaking a bad habit or developing a new good habit. It seems so hard at first but soon, once the new habit is ingrained, it seems odd that we persisted in the old way so long.

2. Keeping a separate thought in my conscious mind that has nothing to do with executing the shot. Does distracting the conscious mind free the subconscious to act or tell it that this activity is unimportant? I don't know.

I gotta go think about this some more, or maybe I can just let my subconscious work it out :)

Steve Turner

Ed:

From a previous post- as usual, I didn't spend enough time developing a critical thought. Got distracted by a shiny object again I guess.

"My understanding of point shooting differs only from your proposed "integrated subconscious process" (may I coin that term and acronym ISP for you?) is that in point shooting, the inputs to the subconscious process are primarily kinesthetic (re previous email; related to situational awareness and body "feel" with visual imput limited to narrow channel 3-D environmental situational awareness)."

O.K., what I neglected to develop in the previous posting was the *difference* between ISP and point shooting. In point shooting, the inputs are primarily (if not exclusively kinesthetic. In ISP, the inputs would *not* be exclusively (or even primarily perhaps?) kinesthetic.

We would integrate the existing "slow fire signal stream" of data into the ISP. THis would include a very heavily weighted visual channel.

Steve Swartz

Ed, here is my take on your comments (about the frustration of trying to explain your concept. Please see if it in some way communicates what you are trying to describle.

“Shooting on the fly.” OK, that’s as good a description as any and I’ll take it for purposes of further developing this rambling collection of words.

It has been stated previously and in many forms that we should bring the gun up, let it settle into a “natural” point of aim, align the sights and acquire the appropriate sight picture, manipulate the trigger, follow though and complete each of these things in the most perfect manner possible as the process for a perfect shot.

Well, as far as holding the gun and “natural point of aim” goes, considering the un-natural position of the person-equipment systems we are using, we are going to have to train ourselves to do the best we can. We continually train in order to achieve the physical control to manipulate the person-equipment system to at least get the shot in the general vicinity of the target.

Then we are watching and looking and learning how to align the sights consistently with each other in order to reduce the angular displacement of the barrel to reduce the error from the general vicinity of the target to somewhere on the paper. We continually train to ensure we can consistently keep the sights aligned.

Then we must use the physical part again to manipulate the person-equipment system to achieve the best possible sight picture to begin achieving anything approaching a consistent series of shots. We train ourselves to take the aligned sights or dot and put them in the best position relative to the target area for our shot process.

Then, through continuous training and feedback, we seek to reduce this observed wobbling and unsupported system to a level of minimum gyrations, maybe even actually acquiring a limited time of no movement?! You know what? Sometimes the sights or dot will actually stop. We have achieved the holy grail of shooting therefore anything that happens next must be a 10, right?

But in order to make the shot, we are faced with the terrifying concept of introducing another influence on this already precarious system by actually having to apply pressure to manipulate the trigger to initiate the shot. My god, you mean we have to introduce another influence onto this already unstable and barely controlled system. Think of the consequences if we fail. We might actually look bad to our peers and damage our sense of self worth. Worse yet, we may actually disturb that almost or perfectly motionless sight-equipment-person system that we have trained so hard to perfect. No wonder chicken fingers abound. Colonel Sanders should be serving them for lunch every day.

So, in general we have been told to and attempted to tame this tempest and put it back in the teapot by proclaiming that the trigger process “should” or “needs” or whatever should be “subconscious”. OK, that’ll work for starters, but is that the final destination? Is a subconscious trigger process all that is needed to complete this process, perfectly, every time, no matter what?

Sometimes I think so and other times….well let’s wildly proposed that (even for that apparently lofty realm of Air and Free Pistol shooting) there might even be another alternative.

If I can strike a baseball or tennis ball that is traveling some relatively high rate of speed with respect to the person-equipment system; or strike a golf ball after making a rather contorted process of storing a significant amount of energy into an almost unsupported and unbalances person-equipment systems and send either flying into the nether regions consistently; then what this heck is so hard about just shooting the damn pistol the same way.

Heck, I’ve spent years learning what the trigger feels like and if I pay attention I know EXACTLY when it will fall. I’ve spent literally (perceived) thousands of hours watching the sight picture and sight alignment. Unless the inside of my mind is complete mush, I should be able to recognize what is OK and not without really thinking about either as well. But if I spend my time recognizing that’s it’s an OK or even perfect picture, then guess what? There is the distinct possibility that “The Moment Has Passed”. So how do I integrate that input into the “subconscious triggering” process unless I’m actually learning how to, dare I say it, anticipate what is about to happen? Or do I just have to wait each time for Uncle Subby to put down his beer and go “OK, you’ve waived that thing around long enough and this is the best its going to be….BANG”?

Finally to the point of all this rambling collection of stuff……..

Maybe eventually (maybe ultimately) the shot process, not just the trigger, but the alignment, sight picture and triggering be reduced to JUST LETTING IT HAPPEN”. So, my modest proposal for those prepared to take the next step it for us to jump off the cliff into open space. Not conscious, not subconscious, just doing it and observing the process. (Ed, this is my extension of your subconscious complete shot process). Zen it if you like, but in perspective I’m there and I’m also not there, just looking.

Maybe it’s time for us to just do it and judge later. Now is the time for all good men to stop training, stop practicing, stop judging and just perform. Humm, it appears that we need a very positive way of stating this “new” objective in our shooting plan. “Stop” is not something that should be in our shooting vocabulary or mental picture. I wonder what we can replace it with?

Ah, but how to train your brain to just perform and quit training and judging. Maybe, there’s the bump in the road that is throwing us off track. We want to hold on to the idea that we have to “concentrate” or “control” something about the process or we have this mental picture of having abandoned all hope of hitting the target because we may need to just let go of the process.

But isn’t that what we have been training for all these years. We’ve spent so much time figuring out what the correct parts are, we get sidetracked when we begin to get most of them consistently correct. Isn’t that the problem that we are facing when the sight alignment and sight picture are absolutely still and perfect and NOTHING happens, because we really do need to abandon that sense of control?

Goodness, what would happen if someone could just pick up a Free Pistol and fire a shot in just a couple of seconds that was a 10? And then do it consistently? Well, apparently they would dominate the sport for a number of years.

Maybe somewhere in each person’s learning curve, there comes a time when we should begin training to perform, not just parts or the process, but the COMPLETE whole act?

Maybe we need to shoot the shot in our mind before raising the gun. If it ain’t exactly correct and we don’t feel, see or experience what we think we should, why waste a bullet. Just try it again, mentally doing nothing but OBSERVING the imaginary shot.

I WILL imagine a shot process that is acceptable to me to believe that it will be a consistent shot process, with a pattern and result that will be consistent with the next one, and the next one and the next one.

Then when I’ve done it right, I can just pick up the gun and do it for real. (Then I’ll take out my trusty screwdriver and move the group to where I want it on the target, if necessary).

If I find myself thinking about anything; then start over. Don’t be surprised if you find this mentally tiring (thinking about nothing for want of a better description) as it takes a great deal of effort in the beginning to only observe (not try, train, judge, correct or control). I think it takes a lot of effort in a special way that we are not used to. But remember Zin’s comment “I’m not smart enough to shoot a bad shot” (or something like that). But he also mentioned that at the end of the match he is mentally exhausted. How can that be? Well, think about it and then don’t think about it. Remember the magic carpet will only work if you don’t think about the word elephant”.

Later, after just shooting, if the groups are not consistent, or there are flyers or something is getting to be more difficult to mentally visualize and then let go and observe, or something seems to interfere with the flow, then maybe we need to return to specific training items to try to get that image, feel, or heart back into the process.

If you want to think of it as shooting on the fly, then by all means do so. I prefer to think of it as the basic process of performing rather than just trying, judging or doing.

None of this is definitive or cast in stone. It’s just the ramblings and tainted observations of someone that does this as a hobby. I’m still searching for a better way to let the potential, that I know is in there somewhere in each of us, find a way to get out.

Here I stand,
Poised on the edge of greatness.
But my feet are stuck
In the quicksand of mediocrity.
I cannot walk or run to escape,
Therefore I must fly.


Cecil

This stuff is getting long to read isn't it :)

After preparing as properly as I can, I boil it down to a "process". It's kind of like going "ummmmm....." in your mind and the gun goes off. I'm pushing the process, not the parts or elements within it. The process is the shot flow, not pieces or steps at a time. Once you start seeing/feeling parts or pieces of the process entering your mind, put the gun down.

The key is to figure out what the elements are and dispose of all else in the shot preparation stage.

Sorry I took awhile to get back to the thread. Things come up...

Thanks for all the input.

I like CraigE's musical reference. I'd like to expand briefly, just a touch. Once you've learned to play a particular chord, the conscious can say play A flat, and everything else to play A flat happens "by itself" via the subconscious. However, let's look deeper and do some comparing. You know what, once the subconscious has a good process, if there's a minor error during the fingering, it is caught and corrected before you realize it. The subconscious took care of that.

Also to Fred's observation:

One issue immediately presented itself - there is no 10 in music.

I would suggest all the proper notes/chords are tens. Those off-key sounds are the sixes, etc.

Additionally, two musicians can both score a perfect match, but sound quite different. Can't that happen in BE? I think we all approach our shots somewhat different from one another.

I like the posts referring to conscious and subconscious being parallel, since both are in operation at once, but the trouble comes from the conscious being employed in interrupting the subconscious in its directing of the unfolding shot. It's kind of like one worker building something, while another worker keeps changing portions, causing the first worker to start over. After awhile the first worker gives up and moves to something else.

Another thing that has been brought up is good/bad shots and ignoring the bad. A process I heartily agree with, but of course I have to add something. First, get away from good/bad. Shots are just shots and the subconscious can learn as much from one as the other. But do focus on what you want. IOW, don't consider a six as bad. In fact, don't consider it as anything except, "a hole appears there if I do that." Then move on to doing the things that create holes where you want them.

ISP might be a valid description of the process when defined as Steve Swartz has in his last post. He's also added in the "heavily weighted visual channel." But this visual channel must be interpretted by the subconscious without the conscious making judgments. And the ISP must be initiated early in the shot plan. And it may very well involve parallel mode as suggested by FredB.

I think Cecil must have hit upon what I was suggesting somewhere in there.<smile> But, it sure seemed a lot more complicated than I thought it was.<another smile> His suggestion to just do instead of train, seems a bit off track because if we are doing, we are training. I think we have to continually train, as we continually train to eat, etc. I think the training has to be in the form of letting our subconscious study all the details. But, I think we need to allow our subconscious a bit more freedom in our shot plans. As to tying my shoes, I have changed my process over the years to cause a specific result. In those instances I studied what process would bring on the desired knot and then built the process and let it go. There was conscious thought put in at first, but now there is very little conscious process.

As a final thought: How about turning the shot over to the subconscious just before the settle, instead of just after?

All comments always welcome...

Take Care,
Ed Hall
http://www.airforceshooting.org/
http://www.starreloaders.com/edhall/

Sorry jackh,

I had meant to add that the "uummm" part sounds like a distractor, which I'm not sure is good, but I like the reference to it being a process. What I'm suggesting is that the subconscious portion be expanded to include more up front.

Sorry if I didn't address a specific poster or idea. I'm actually still studying a bunch of the stuff, but I'm also juggling time with some home issues.

Thanks again for all the posts.

Take Care,
Ed Hall
http://www.airforceshooting.org/
http://www.starreloaders.com/edhall/

Hi Ed
The "ummmmm..." I mentioned was intended to imply a final drive to center with the hold, eye, and trigger. This driving process I think is started consciously, but the parts I listed are automatic. The drive itself has little to do with hold, sight or trigger. It's a drive with a goal. Compare pushing a car. You put your shoulder to it and push in a coordinated way. You don't think about what your hands and your feet are doing unless obstacles to the goal appear to distract from the flow. Then you would consciously adjust change hands or feet. You might even say "Ummmmm...." as you push. Dig?

This is my version of using the trigger to steer the sight. But those words by themselves are very confusing. I think the trigger process itself can help the sighting, and vice versa. Emails from B Zins have helped me tremendously on this.

I think my preparations and settle this way get me to say an arbitrary 90% of the centering process. In other words I arrive near the center, and a final consciously started drive gets another 5% of going to center. Then I depend on a parallel sub-c to do the final 5% polishing off of the perfect shot. I believe the sub-c can only do so much. We have to give it as much as we can to work with. Thats why I arbitrarily say 5%. Training and practice would/will do doubt improve the process. i.e. improving prep and settle to 95% of center, then the drive would need less intensity, less consciousness.

Let me leave it as
Deliberate preparations
Conscious final initiation (drive)
Sub-c final touches

Ed:

Your comment about continually training IS exactly the difference I was trying to make.

Maybe, and I'm way out there on this, but maybe that is the next step that we are missing.

For most of our shooting careers (for want of a better term) we are in that training mode, even at the subsconcious level. BUT if we are in training mode, then somewhere there has to be that consideration, process or whatever that compares and uses the input, process and feedback (here's the important difference) and makes some type of judgement call on the process and results. And maybe that "judgement" however minor, conscious or subconscious (or unconscious?) is the bump in the road, the start of the chicken finger, the last vestage of control that makes us hesitate for that awful millisecond that move the shot from the present into the past.

So my point was to get even the "subsconcious" out of the training loop or feedback process, so we can perfrom to our best in real time.

We usually don't miss the glass, or miss catching the ball or fail to respond to the input appropriately unless some other input is different than the learned pattern. (Somebody moved the glass, we slipped on the grass just a bit, etc, etc.)

Yes, I'm no expert in this mind game thing. (I've come to the contest seriously under equiped in that department.) But after this much "training"; how much more does it take?

Off to consider other problems for a while. I'll probably be at the range this weekend trying to think about nothing. We'll see what happens.

Thanks again for the comments and discussions. It helps me to try to put my thoughts in order, even if it turns out to be a blind alley.

Cecil Rhodes

CR10XGuest wrote:For most of our shooting careers (for want of a better term) we are in that training mode, even at the subsconcious level. BUT if we are in training mode, then somewhere there has to be that consideration, process or whatever that compares and uses the input, process and feedback (here's the important difference) and makes some type of judgement call on the process and results. And maybe that "judgement" however minor, conscious or subconscious (or unconscious?) is the bump in the road, the start of the chicken finger, the last vestage of control that makes us hesitate for that awful millisecond that move the shot from the present into the past.

So my point was to get even the "subsconcious" out of the training loop or feedback process, so we can perfrom to our best in real time.

I might be off target here in reading what I believe you're saying but bear with me ;-)

You cannot remove the subconscious - it's impossible. Your subconscious is working pretty much all the time - especially whilst shooting. All you can do is give it quality instructions. By that I mean feed good thoughts and vibes and focus on the positive. Re-inforce the good shots and skip the poor ones.

To train the subconscious you need to separate out the elements of firing a shot and focus on one single goal. So for example making the trigger release smooth. The good result is a smooth shot release - it has nothing to do with the hole in the paper, that's irrelevant.

The other good thing with the subconscious is that it learns equally well away from the range. So dry firing is great. Visualisation is equally good - plus you only visualise good shots - even better !

In actual competitions you just need to free the subconscious to do the job in hand. Once you can truly do that, all the time, you're on the road to being a world class shooter (but I didn't say how long the road was ;-) ).

Rob.

Sorry, I did not mean to imply removing the subsconcious. Of course you can't do that.

My point was to create a new condition to try and remove training, judgement, feedback whatever from all parts (after you're doing it correctly) so it (the subsconcious, conscious, and everything else) will be released from ANY constraints.

Yes, just freeing the subsconcious is pretty much what I'm trying to describe. And that even includes any "thoughts" pardon the play on words, of quality instructions, guidance or anything except "just seeing and doing".

Any if we haven't trained (a lot) on that, how can you get to that state in competition? Therefore my comments on a new level / type of training in order to learn how to just do it.

Thanks/cr

[quote="Rob........

To train the subconscious you need to separate out the elements of firing a shot and focus on one single goal. So for example making the trigger release smooth. The good result is a smooth shot release - it has nothing to do with the hole in the paper, that's irrelevant. ......

Rob.[/quote]


Isn't the goal actually "firing a [good] shot"? And isn't the smooth trigger release only a primary element along with alignment (hold) and eye on sight? These elements are really coordinated physical things to do the shot by the eye, body, and specifically trigger finger.

Ed (and all):

Since you kicked this off, I have been spending quite a bit of time thinking about this and conducting experiments. Thanks! I have resisted "burning down" my shot plan however; I have found that was not entirely necessary.

Allow me to offer some observations for feedback.

In my musings, I realized that indeed I have experienced the "ISP" on many occasions- as the sights came down from the loft into the settle area, the shot breaks before the settle is recognized (to varied result).

So for the last week or so I have been "releasing permission to shoot" duing the sag to settle instead of waiting until settled conditions are recognized.

Too early to tell- still playing around with it.

A surprising number of tens.

I keep a can of spackle handy.

Your mileage may vary.

Steve

p.s. in analyzing Rika traces, I note that in many instances my muzzle trace doesn't find the ten ring for several seconds into the settle. My muzzle most assuredly does *not* find the ten ring and then wobble around, as Ed suggested in an earlier post. Sometimes, the "first ten I see" occurs several seconds into the pre-settle phase. This would create problems for me in executing the ISP with any degree of reliability.

jackh wrote: Isn't the goal actually "firing a [good] shot"? And isn't the smooth trigger release only a primary element along with alignment (hold) and eye on sight? These elements are really coordinated physical things to do the shot by the eye, body, and specifically trigger finger.

The ultimate goal is good shots but that isn't the training goal. The training goal is to build up the elements that make a good shot. To do that you have to deconstruct the shot process into it's individual elements.

Remember the conscious mind is pretty simple. It can only do one thing at a time and only concentrate on one thing at a time. The conscious mind is the teacher for the subconscious. So by perfecting each element one by one, you teach the subconscious all the good bits. You do however need to do the proper shot cycle but you concentrate on only one aspect at a time. Now you need to reconstruct the full process before you start shooting comps otherwise it won't come together properly. This is all part of the process of building a training plan and why it needs to be designed around the big competitions in your shooting season.

Rob.

Ed,

Your original proposal sounds a lot like some of the "play theory" used in childhood development. Just let them have the tools, and find out by themselves what works best for them. This leads to the different batting stances seens in kids baseball, ways to hit tennis balls or golf balls, ect.

Seems to me part of the "problem" with this is that coaches cannot simply tell the new athlete to do this, or do that in order to improve. It becomes an individualized process at a very early stage (rather than what we have now - trying to force all new shooters into a similar process until they get to a rather high level, and then telling them they need to become their own coach.

I suspect the current method is better for greater numbers, because too many would not garner enough success early on to continue with the program if they had to be both athlete and coach at such an early stage. However, even those like Tiger Woods eventually have mentors to help them work through the problems (back to basics??).

As far as when to turn the shot process over to the sub/unconscious, we have taught our shooters to switch from thinking in words (left brain), to a picture of the perfect sight picture (right brain) as the rifle hits their cheek (NPA was done on prior lifting of the rifle, but it's suprising how often we get deep tens on the NPA lift). This allows the sub/unconscious to be ready to fire the shot at recognition of the first ten.

This discussion has pointed out that this is a "passive" method, ending before the shot is actually fired, so this year we will try subsituting a picture (right brain) of the projectile going through the ten. That should get us pas the point of trigger let off.

Great discussion.