Brian’s Blog
To say Brian is a chip off the old block would actually mean he’s two chips off of two amazing blocks. Brian has been shooting most of his life and finds great pleasure in teaching others the art and skill of the business end of a shotgun. Send Brian a message if there are any areas of information you would like for him to respond to.
In order of date
Believe in “Regardless of Result”
You will never rise to the level of your goals. You will always fall to the level of your systems in preparation. Now, when you can internalize that, then that means if you don’t do well, you ne...
Excellence as a Way of Life
There’s a direct correlation between the way you practice and the way you perform. Most shooters’ evaluation of their ability is a little or (in some instances) a lot higher than reality, ...
Turning Rituals into Habits
Here’s another simple thing that shooters don’t do, and it’s a real game changer from the consistency standpoint. After breaking a target, they don’t stop to replay what they just saw happen s...
Peak Performance, Repetition and Failure
Peak performance, regardless of level, is still peak performance. And in the beginning, performance in front of others with an unknown outcome brings about all sorts of fears of the unknown. This situ...
The Post-Shot Habit
The ability to visualize in detail and execute the preloaded visual process in practice to see if it was correct is where most shooters fail to really get better and develop the mental side of their g...
Consistency, Consistency, Consistency
How well you understand that the gun must be to the right or left of the target has little to do with your ability to consistently do it. The number of times you have done it has everything to do with...
Gun Mount Practice Tips
We have discovered the most frequent mistake shooters make when practicing their mount at home in the garage or gun room. When they mount the gun, they are looking at something – a light switch ...
Surprise and Sacrifice
For most shooters, there is no rhyme or rhythm in their results when shooting a shotgun at a moving target – painted or feathered. If you shoot a shotgun enough, when you’re surprised by a tar...
Ego and Evaluation
Shooters can get so obsessed with breaking the target instead of the process. You can’t do anything unless you have a plan. This game is all about ego. And ego is all about breaking the bird. So...
The Contents of Your Pre-Shot Routine
Less is important. The mistake that most people make in the beginning is they put way too many things in their pre-shot routine, which means they haven’t done enough of what they do in their rou...
Regardless of the Result
Leading up to a big event, we’re all excited to go to the Open or Nationals. But if I expect to do well, I need to have to time to practice, and for maybe months or weeks and days leading up to ...
Don’t Sweat the Long Stuff
You need to be absolutely lethal within 25 yards. If you’re going to shoot tournaments, it’s not the long stuff that kills you. It’s the stuff that’s within the 20-to-25-yard m...
Unforced Errors in C-Class
“I’ve been shooting for two years and should be shooting better than C class. I have too many unforced errors. Thoughts on my dilemma?” This shooter has been shooting for two years. H...
Gun Fit in New Shooters
In working with a lot of the high school athletes and the high school coaches, we’ve learned that gun fit is a huge thing for them. There are no guns out there that are going to fit somebody that...
Prediction and Execution
A success or a failure without a prediction never makes its way to the long-term memory. It’s absolutely wasted. It’s the prediction and the execution of the prediction that allows you to ...
The Limits of Your Working Memory
Your working memory is very limited in how many things it can handle at one time. It can’t handle more than three to four things synchronously at one time. When more things enter the workspace, ...
How Shooters’ Perception Evolves
Let’s get back to the evolution of perceptions shooters go through as they gain more and more experience in deliberate practice and shooting tournaments. Everyone has a sequence in their brain that ...
The Rhythm in Your Routine
It is not so much what is in your routine that is important, but the rhythm of your routine that allows your brain to know exactly when you will be calling. This in turn allows the brain to begin doin...
Creating and Strengthening New Sequences
Consistently pointing ahead or in front of a steadily moving object is a new sequence in our brains. And like everything else we do, it must be repeated enough times so that it happens without us havi...
Skill and Repetition
We have discovered many things in our years of shooting and coaching, and one of the most startling ones is the direct link between the quality, frequency, and intensity of a shooter’s practice and ...
Eye Dominance and Visual Delay
The instant the new shooter says something about the confusing picture, they are immediately misdiagnosed as “cross-dominant!” There is a perception out there that if you are right-handed and righ...
Dealing with Compliments Effectively
Eventually, your game will elevate to another level and your fellow shooters will begin to notice your scores are either becoming more consistent and/or higher. You will begin to be complimented on yo...
Light Cheek Pressure
Something that must be considered is the amount of cheek pressure required to shoot the gun consistently. If the salesman says you will have to cheek the gun a little tighter, don’t buy the gun. Yea...
Flushing Birds
When shooting flushing birds, you can’t use shooting sticks and you can’t take a little extra time and aim. The target is always moving at an unknown speed and most of the time an unknown distance...
Building Your Habits in Practice
Skill building is a process that few really understand. And even fewer are willing to put in the time and repetitions necessary to really build skill in their shotgun game. There are so many shooters ...
Keep a Calm Mind
You are going to miss. Accept it and move on. But knowing what missing does to your physiology can be very helpful. While we’ve observed that different shooters react in different ways, they all spe...
How to Turn a Negative into a Positive
If you are competitive in skeet or sporting clays, eventually you’re going to have one of those days where you could not put a three-word sentence together and your game is as mixed up as a soccer g...
The Unique Challenges of Wingshooting
Game shooting offers its own unique challenges when compared to clay shooting, not the least of which is that the game bird has a brain and can change its line, speed, and angle with a mere flick of a...
Visualization in Sporting Clays vs Trap and Skeet
In sporting, the ability to visualize in detail the movie of the shots you are about to ask your brain to create is critical. But it’s increasingly more difficult due to presentation being different...
Go Out and Have an Honest Practice Routine
Push yourself to the limit and make a commitment that when you get to the gun club, you’re going to go out and practice, and start working on specific issues. And if you can’t do it, you n...
All the “Be Sure”s
Positive soundalikes: they sound positive, but they’re a way for your brain to say, “Hang on, now, be careful. You’re down three. Be careful. Come on now, be sure now. Be sure you see th...
When You’re Out of Sync
I’m sure you’ve all experienced times when your synchronization and flow between your hands and body are gone. And try as you may, your body is all out of sync. Whenever you feel your body...
The Power of Affirmation
If you hear it, you must instantly turn the phrase around and make it a positive affirmation for you. This will take some real work on your behalf. But after a week or so, it will turn into a fun game...
Commitment to Your Plan
You must become totally committed to how and where the shot you’re about to take will come together – both in practice, and on game day. But you’ve got to be committed to doing it li...
Be Lethal on Easy Shots
Do you want to get out of the C-Class plateau? Then learn how to be absolutely lethal within 25 yards. If you’re going to shoot tournaments, it’s not the long stuff that kills you: it̵...
Are You Comfortable? You’re Not Learning!
People are afraid to try things that they perceive is out of their comfort zone. And your learning occurs at the edge of your comfort zone. If you’re comfortable, you’re not learning. You ...
Force Your Brain to Recall in Practice
If you’re not forcing your brain to recall, and put together different circuits, you’re not preparing for game day. When you walk into a sporting station, you’ve never seen it before...
Assessing Your Own Performance
How far you’re able to mount the gun in front of the bird is really determined by how many times you’ve mounted it out there. It’s more determined by how many times you’ve moun...
The Chains of Habit
Our study into skill building and mental processing reveals an interesting facet: our past heavily colors our perception and reaction to present experiences. Our brain develops filters based on our pa...
Developing Constants
A common mistake among shotgunners is to mount the gun, chase the target, and hastily correct the shot at the end – often followed by a string of frustrated exclamations. However, this approach igno...
The Impact of Gun Fit and Visualization in Shooting
Gun fit and visualization are two critical aspects of successful shooting, as demonstrated in a recent clinic. The OSP system, with its emphasis on understanding individual shooter needs, proved its w...
Refinement and Focus
Achieving mastery in clay or wingshooting is about more than just accumulating hours of practice or mastering the technicalities of the sport. It involves a deep understanding of one’s own menta...
Mechanical Fundamentals in Shooting
A key observation from years of coaching is the impact of cheek pressure on consistency and improvement in shooting. Excessive cheek pressure, often believed to provide a more aggressive approach, can...
Understanding and Application of Knowledge
All skills start as mere knowledge. However, the crux of mastery lies in understanding when and how to apply this knowledge. Let’s apply this to skeet. Identifying and correcting specific issues, su...
Diagnosing Skeet and Sporting Clays Misses
Skeet and sporting clays both present unique challenges. Before you can even begin learning how to compete in skeet, you need to learn how to break targets in the same breakpoints on each station ever...
Paying Attention to Your Successes
We’ve learned that, in building a good mental game, you have to look at things for what they really are. Our brains are predisposed to not give successes nearly as much thought or emotion as we do f...
Shooting “Bling”
If I could find ten people that would give me a million dollars to have a AA game in sporting clays overnight, I’d make them all drink a pint of goat’s blood and then leave town with their money. ...
Expectations and Honesty
Expectations should be about the time that you put in and being honest with yourself. Being honest with yourself is what it’s all about. When you’re in the cage, it’s just you and th...
Letting Go and Setting Goals
If you’re competing to have a very open look at who you are and your abilities, then you have to admit to yourself that when you go to a competition you have to let go of caring about how you shoot....
Looking Behind the Barrel
The very act of putting the gun in front of the target without seeing it makes the shooter want to look at it. When the target comes to the gun, the gun is part of the picture. This is significant bec...
What Caused the Errors?
Deciding what caused the errors is the most critical part of self-evaluation. That’s one of the unique things about our system. Once you start working on being really smooth, once you’re early in ...
Hard Skills – Moving and Mounting
Hard skills are the skills that you have to have a hundred percent correct all the time. It would be a fisherman’s ability to drop a jig not only in the cup but have the jig go on a flight pattern s...
Peripheral Acceptance
We all have a problem letting that gun go, and it’s periphery acceptance. There’s no doubt about that. When you exceed your peripheral acceptance, your focus ratio goes straight down the hole. But...
The Post-Shot Routine and Happiness
When you visualize what the shot will look like (not necessarily the lead but what the end picture is going to look like) you know you’re going to be looking at that bird away from that gun. Being a...
From Thinking (Behind) to Doing (Ahead)
When you’re in the subconscious mode, the anticipation circuit is projecting forward. It is anticipating what’s going to happen and it is coordinating all of your movements to bring about the acti...
Practicing Recall
The thing that is least practiced is recall: looking at a target and letting the working memory go to the long-term memory. Then letting the long-term memory make the file and hand it off to the worki...
Eyes Still and Hands Relaxed
I want to begin the shot (i.e., closing the gun and addressing the bird) in the same physiological position every single time. It doesn’t matter if there are no clouds. I may look at the clouds ...
The Importance of Instant Feedback
Getting instant feedback is critical because it tells your brain whether or not it’s doing what you want it to do. Typically, the only feedback that we see the average performers give to themselves ...
Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Scorecard
– Are you in sync and stabilizing every shot? – Are you staying in the shots long enough to have a post-visual routine confirming to your brain to do it again, which in turn becomes your p...
Solutions for Beginners
Here’s a solution for the beginning shooter; someone who is shooting between 50 and 65 percent: – Do the three-bullet drill and the flashlight drill until your arms fall off. – Drill s...
Setbacks Follow Success
You’ve got to stay in control of your expectations. Without expectation, it’s very easy to perceive the subtlety of what you do. With expectation, you will always perceive the boundary. Remember t...
Seeing Over the Lever
If you’re shooting a cross-eyed target with a lot of lead, there’s a technique that can help you. This is especially useful for long, high tower shots, big, crossing belly chandelles, and ...
What Prevents You from Self-Correcting?
These are things that keep people from being able to self-correct: – Muzzle awareness. You need to begin to recognize when you look at the barrel in the setup, which leads to awareness in the s...
Merging
Imagine what your car would be doing if you merged in front of the car like your gun barrel merges in front of a target. When I tell people this and they finally get it, they begin laughing. But what ...
Shooting in the Rain – Get in the Game!
If you want to become a good competitive shooter, just like practicing your gun mount, you got to put a number on your back and get in the game. In your first year in master class, shoot every event a...
Process Goals
When you are determined to not move before you see the target, a lot of good things can happen. A lot of great things can line up and take place. We talk about focus so much, and God knows when you ge...
Planning and Visualization
In shotgunning, planning and visualization are critical components to success. When faced with a challenging target, it’s essential to approach it with determination and a clear plan of action. ...
Repetition Under Pressure
You can practice all you want to, but you’re going to have learn that from being in the game. You’re going to have to get in the game and you’re going to have learn that while you’re in the ga...
Self-Correction for the Intermediate Shooter
What’s the solution for an intermediate shooter who’s shooting 65 to 79 or 80 percent? They’re looking at the gun in the setup. They’re trying to be perfect in the first 85% of the sho...
Establishing a Baseline Target
You need a baseline target. This is a target that you always come back to in order to get your rhythm back. Because there will come a time, for whatever reason, that the wheels come off and you just c...
Practice Shooting Rising Birds
Most shooters can’t hit a teal going up two-thirds or three-fourths of the way up the line. It’s the weakest target presentation for 90 percent of shooters. They’re going to wait until i...
Defining “Stabilizing the Picture”
Here’s a definition of stabilizing the picture. At the end of the shot, as the bird and the gun come together, you hold onto the shot just a fraction after you mount so that you’re sure that the g...
Anticipation and Focus Ratios
Fear is only in the present or in the past. It cannot exist in the future. It takes you there, but it’s not there. It’s your choice. Fear is a conscious reaction to a perceived set of circumstance...
Shooting at Nationals: Practice Pays Off
Shooting at Nationals: Practice Pays Off The targets at Nationals were spot-on. There were no “gimmes.” Every target took work. Everything we shot, from the main to the K-Kup to super sporting, a...
How I Got Ready for Nationals
How I Got Ready for Nationals I got to practice a lot more than last year – about 500 targets before leaving for San Antonio. And man, did I learn a lot about what I’ll need to do to get ready...
Sight Picture and Speed
There are two parts to every shot: sight picture and speed. It can be that simple at first. But, as you get more advanced, the routine you follow becomes more crucial. As you continue on your journey ...
Keep the Barrel in the Periphery
Keep the barrel in the periphery! The barrel is always fuzzy – never in focus – as it has a place on the edge of your vision. A common problem I see all the time is the gun starts in the ...
Transformation at Advance School
It was amazing to watch the transformation of everyone that attended the Advance School the last two weeks. As a coach, it makes me so happy to push my students to the next level, even when they can b...
Hello from Brian!
I will be available to give lessons at Able’s Gun Club in Huntsville, TX, and our home field at American Shooting Centers. I hope everyone is staying safe. We are all good here in Conroe, TX. W...
Note from a Professional Engineer
“I love OSP. In my first lesson, I took two shots and Brian wanted to know if I was a lawyer or engineer. I knew I was in the right place.” – Larry C....
Another Novice Success Story
Dear Brian, My son Louis and I took your novice course this summer in Houston. I had a camo Browning 12-gauge two-barrel with a stock that was too short. Since then, I have followed your advice and go...
Happy Clinic Student – OSP Method Works!
A letter from another satisfied customer. The OSP method works! Brian, I have video proof that your instruction has paid off for me in a big way. We were using 12-gauge #4 shot with a speed rating of ...
Novice Clinics at the OSP Field in Houston, Texas
I teach novice clinics once a month, usually the second weekend, at our home field in Houston, Texas. Boy, have they taken off! It’s a great way to get started shooting a shotgun the correct way by ...
Keep it Simple!
It baffles me how complicated people make this game. Why can’t it be simple like 3 o’clock and 9 o’clock, same speed at the end? I had a guy yesterday who would call “pull” and as soon as he...
Clear the Mechanism
I thought about this video after the September Coaching Hour. Pretty much sums it up!...
Shooting After Months Off
I was at a shoot last Tuesday and hadn’t shot my gun in months. I shot great! I think I missed seven targets. I discovered I need to work on teal targets on the way up. And for some reason, I have t...