TargetTalk

hat sort of PT routine should an aspiring ifle shooter follow?? What muscle groups are important and need to be strng?? Please advise!! Will appreciate your help!

I don't think strength is important for rifle shooters.

You should not be using strength to hold your rifle.

What is important is good generally physical condiditon, balance, and flexibility.

You should be doing a combination of cardiovascular workouts, moderate strength/weight training, stretching, and balance exercises.

haha...you contradicted yourself twp. said we don't need strength then said we needed moderate strength training.

anyways i disagree with twp. by strengthening your muscles you're going to fatigue less and since we've started pt, i've noticed that my holds have gotten better. we focus mainly on the core and then do some balance work. basically we do sit-ups and variations of sit-ups (to get all of the abdominal muscles groups) then we roll over and do a bunch of back extensions or variations of a back extension. when we lift, we do smaller weight and higher reps because we don't want to bulk up, just get stronger. we also do a few awkward lifts (like dumbell bench press off a physio-ball) so that we're working our core for balance as well as the normal muscle group that we're lifting for. we also do a few balance exercises and use the big rubber bands to help with stretching (flexibility). and of course there's some cardio at the end, which is probably the most important part.

why is core training so important?? does it help yr stabilty??? and your holds??

thanks for the help. do you know som3e specific core exercises?

seemehaha wrote: when we lift, we do smaller weight and higher reps because we don't want to bulk up,

Actually we agree,

You just said it better than I did.

What I meant was I don't think strength training is as important as cardio and stretching.

Shooters don't need to bulk up like a football player. But they need to be in good physical condition.

TWP wrote:What I meant was I don't think strength training is as important as cardio and stretching.

Shooters don't need to bulk up like a football player. But they need to be in good physical condition.

I think you're confusing yourself, or your terminology. Strength training is important but there's two different ways to do it and only one is of use to shooters. You do not want the heavy weight type exercises that build up great muscles, you want to do repetitions of low weight exercises. The former develops the wrong sort of muscles, whereas with the low weight repetitions you develope muscles with better fine control.

You also want cardiovascular workouts and exercises to develope and strengthen core stabilty.

Rob.

Rob's got it right what you want is muscular endurance, not maximum strength or hypertrophy(big muscles). Unless of course you are very out of shape an have to build a little muscle mass. Muscular endurance is usually done by light loads lots of reps. Cardio, and flexibiltity are also important as mentioned by others.

Rob,

Nail on the head once again mate. I am down the gym several time a week but when you talk to the guys and say I want to do 60+ reps and 2 sets they look at you like you are crazy. but that what shooters do ! I do find that the more intelegent of the bunch then learn a healthy respect for what we acutaly do, especial if you say " and then hold it still each time !" ;)

JY

Is muscle mass/brute strength necessarily a bad thing? I realize that you seldom see hulking Free Pisol or Air Pistol shooters, but I wonder whether this is because the two are incompatible, or simply that no "visible" shooters have an interest in strength/muscle-mass weightlifting.

I would think that the strength itself isn't a detriment, and a proper, balanced training regimen would not result in any loss of flexibility. Is there any documented evidence that there would be a loss of "fine motor control", or is that simply something that "seems like a reasonable conclusion"?

This was developed a few years ago by Amber Darland for the US team. Dan Durban and Sommer Wood use it for the CMP Rifle camp.

It was presented at the coach school this past summer at Camp Perry

Click on the DARLAND link

http://www.vc4hss.com/_Coaches/index.html

I would say that being bulked up is bad for shooting unless you stretch the muscles out alot. You don't want short muscle strength. Any shooter in, for instance, Standing will have shots where his wobble brings the black of the bull in contact with the black of the front aperture. I've heard this called black-to-black and is a fairly bad thing. This is why many shooters use bigger front apertures, to avoid this. It's bad because when it happens you will pull (with your muscles) the sights back on. It's not a problem with the shooter, it's subconscious. Almost every time, the gun will be pulled back towards the center. If you're too strong you may pull the sights back off the other side of the bull.

Rifle shooters need brute strength to carry all that gear . The average buttplate collection , if smelted would make a 16' runabout .

Chris

cdf wrote:Rifle shooters need brute strength to carry all that gear . The average buttplate collection , if smelted would make a 16' runabout .

Chris

hahahaha....that's great.

We are unsure whether pistol shooters are lazy rifle shooters , or wether rifle shooters are brain damadged pistol shooters .

Chris

Having been a shooter who has done both (and knowing many more of the same!) I would say it depends on which one you did first . . . a rifle shooter who migrates to pistol is of course showing excellent taste and judgement, while a pistol shooter who picks up the rifle "Just Ain't Right!"

=8^o

Steve Swartz

+1 Mr. S. , we show proper compassion , but it's hard not to laff when they try to walk around in their shooting trousers .

Chris

TomAmlie wrote:Is muscle mass/brute strength necessarily a bad thing? I realize that you seldom see hulking Free Pisol or Air Pistol shooters, but I wonder whether this is because the two are incompatible, or simply that no "visible" shooters have an interest in strength/muscle-mass weightlifting.

I would think that the strength itself isn't a detriment, and a proper, balanced training regimen would not result in any loss of flexibility. Is there any documented evidence that there would be a loss of "fine motor control", or is that simply something that "seems like a reasonable conclusion"?

Tom,
There is good evidence as to the two different sorts of muscles and how one enables fine control, the other heavy work. I think it's well described somewhere on Patricks site (www.targetshooting.ca), but you might need to search therein. Alternatively do some searching on muscle types in google.

Rob.

cdf wrote:+1 Mr. S. , we show proper compassion , but it's hard not to laff when they try to walk around in their shooting trousers .
Chris

That's okay Chris, we try not to laugh when we see that the entire rifle target fits into the aiming mark for the pistol ;)

The first time I saw a rifle target I thought the .5mm thing in the middle was fly poop .

Chris

The January/February issue of USA Shooting News magazine will feature an article on working out for shooters. It was written by a certified physical trainer from the U.S. Olympic Committee.

If you are a member, you should receive the copy in December. If you are not, you can join or subscribe by visiting usashooting.org.