When shooting a rifle, the shooter is looking down the barrel and lining it up with the target. While holding the barrel on the target, the shooter begins to squeeze the trigger and the gun goes off. But when the gun is going to go off should be a surprise to the shooter. When shooting […]
Whether you are a clays or wing shooter, none of us start with the same game we end up with. What we do and what we see is an evolution based on how much we practice our passion with the smooth bore. As my late friend and client, Boone and Crockett Club measurer Homer Saye […]
The elevation of the target has a lot to do with foot position and the front hand’s grip position. When shooting overhead targets off high towers, the front hand must come back towards the action of the gun just to be able to get the gun butt to your shoulder! When shooting targets on the […]
Here’s another anomaly we often see often in younger shooters. With the gun mounted, their elbows are sticking straight out to either side. To this day, we cannot understand why they do this. Your elbows on both arms should be a comfortable 45 degrees to the line of the bore – not 90 degrees. You […]
Shooters who practice more single targets moving the breakpoint and predicting how and where they will break the target and then executing their prediction gain a consistency in their game quicker than those who just shoot the course to try to shoot a good score. In much the same way, skeet shooters who are more […]
Skeet and sporting clays are similar in many ways, but there is one basic difference: the height at which the targets are broken. In skeet, the targets are hooped and set so they have a common crossing point over the center stake. If you could take a picture frame and center it up over the […]
When the stance is right for the individual height and body shape, maintaining balance is simple and repeatable. Maintaining a central balance point and good shooting posture so the gun fits is a result. Women tend to have a top-heavier variance – some more that others – and men tend to have a heavy variance […]
Let’s talk about the different clay target games: how their similarities and differences affect stance, weight displacement, and balance. In trap and skeet, the targets are the constant. Both games are played pre-mounted and most shooters are “in the gun pretty tight.” And because they have the gun pulled firmly into their shoulder, they must […]
Because of the balance issue, shooters with different centers of gravity could need a more open stance, a more closed stance, or more upright or leaning forward stance to position their head and cheek in front of their shoulder pocket. So, to say that there’s one way to couple the body and the gun in […]
We find ourselves observing people doing things they’ve practiced enough that they can be done without thinking. Then it becomes more and more evident that, through repetition, the brain has learned to push its awareness and anticipation farther ahead of what it’s doing at the moment. When a person becomes skillful at any task, that […]
While balance alone allows for us to move through our complex lives every day, maintaining balance is taken for granted by humans until you reach your 70s. Then you’re made aware of just how important and precious the gyro of balance really is. If you don’t believe me, ask someone who has a bout with […]
You don’t give it any thought as you travel through your everyday life but staying in balance is a full-time job that has been turned over to the automaticity part of the brain. This is due to the massive use this circuit gets as you walk, jog, run, play golf, bend over at the waist […]
Here is another phrase we have heard in conversations: “To shoot that gun well, you’re going to have to apply more cheek pressure and have to roll your head forward to pull your eye down closer to the rib.” This will not work, but it’s a phrase used by people who are trying to sell […]
One of the first things we learned is that when shooters mount a shotgun in the showroom, they always put more cheek pressure on the comb than they do when they’re actually shooting the gun. When we mention this to shooters, there is always one or two who aren’t convinced. So we have them mount […]
Ask any well-read shooter and they will tell you that gun fit in wing/clay shooting is really important. But few know what gun fit really is. Because they haven’t put in the time to consistently mount the gun, their gun cannot be fitted to them. There are so many opinions on whether or not a […]
Skill is built through simple repetition in the beginning. As you become more skillful, the repetition becomes less simple and then more complex, as well as predicted prior to performing it. Through this process, the brain begins to “chunk” the circuits together so they become one movement. The time it takes you to let this […]
Choke is a mystery many will never understand. And as a result, it will confound more people than it will help. My research has proven that you can adjust the diameter of the shot cloud inside of 25 yards greater than you can beyond. If a target is going to be broken inside of 25 […]
At the end of the day, recoil is the enemy. Anything you can do to mitigate recoil will be an advantage. We all have Isis recoil systems on our Krieghoffs and absolutely love them. One-ounce loads at 1200 fps is plenty. Try to use the ammo you will be able to find at the shoots […]
Improved cylinder, light modified, modified and improved modified have the same 25” reliable killing circle at 25 yards. A .020 modified choke has the same diameter reliable pattern from 25-45 yards! If it’s close, shoot skeet. If it’s not close, shoot modified.
Using too much choke on close targets is just a bad as not using enough choke on distant targets. The normal progression in skill building in sporting clays is lethality at 25 yards, then at 35 yards, and then finally at 45 yards. Our research has shown us time and again that as your experience […]
Relentless repetition builds skill. Building skill with a shotgun is a long-range goal and takes a lot of patience, time, and effort – not to mention money! Remember, the gun is the cheapest part. The gun will evolve with experience and repetitions. Few people understand that in the beginning a person’s gun fit will change […]
The file for the next shot is created in our long-term memory and then handed off to the working memory to execute the shot. Our long-term memory is infinite, but our working memory is limited in both capacity and duration. It’s important that your memory is not overwhelmed with too many things. When there are […]
Most shooters don’t realize that each time they prepare to take a shot at a moving target for the first time, the long-term memory takes bits and pieces from different files it remembers from its past. Then it assembles a unique file to break the target you are planning to break. With experience, it can […]
The OSP system of shooting allows for better, more consistent performances with less and less practice once you’ve mastered the fundamentals of setup and movement and have a defined, comfortable amount of muzzle awareness. This is best done through deliberate practice with a detailed movie of where and how you want the target broken. This […]
“Same speed at the end” allows you to see what it looked like as the shot was triggered so the shot can be replicated or corrected. When shooting the OSP system, do not get involved with the lead. That will increase muzzle awareness, which will alter the gun speed without you knowing it. In order […]
I’m amazed at the number of shooters who are still trying to pull away from targets and are erratic at best in their scores. Pull away shooters miss a lot of targets in the last half of a stand and have a difficult time self-correcting. The older you are, the more you have to train […]
One conclusion I have come to about gun fit is that when it really does fit with light cheek pressure and shoots 50/50, all your sight pictures make sense. This makes them more consistent, as well as easier to visualize and predict. Most shooters with off the shelf guns are shooting high left (for right-handers) […]
A local shooter here in Houston who is moving from skeet into sporting clays has learned a valuable lesson about stock fit. He’s in the pattern stock phase and is shooting an “Ashed” comb on his Perazzi. He’s shooting better skeet than he ever has and is doing quite well with the OSP system of […]
If you feel like you have to mount your gun perfectly to hit anything, your gun does not fit. Did you know the harder you have to put your cheek down on the comb to make your gun shoot where you want it, the more you will look at the barrel during the shot? You […]
Building sight pictures is why you practice. Not enough shooters put in the time to practice deliberately to build their inventory in their long-term memory. Most shooters just go shoot the course and play at practice with no preload, no routine, and nothing structured. If you want to get better, structure your practice around shooting […]
Just looking hard at a target will land you solidly in the mid-60s to low 70s. There are two things you need to consciously think about. One, keep the target on the correct side of the barrel. And two, match gun speed with target speed. Any more thought than that and you will overload the […]
It seems that there are coaches out there who tell shooters to just look hard at the target and not see the muzzle. But if you don’t know what it looked like when you pulled the trigger how do you replicate the shot to run the station? How do you self-correct after a miss?
Without prediction and execution of your prediction in practice, you are not building long-term memory. The part of this game that you are supposed to trust is what you have built in practice and in tournaments. You must practice and shoot tournaments deliberately to build your library.
Random practice, as opposed to blocked practice, requires the brain to retrieve skill circuits from your long-term memory. While you don’t get the feel-good of shooting the same target over and over 20 times, you’re training your brain to retrieve on the spot, which it will have to do on game day. Random practice can […]
The more we watch the shooters we work with evolve, the better we get at communicating the little things that speed up that improvement. While each shooter is different, they all must make similar commitments to getting better. We have shooters who come to us who want to excel at a really fast pace. They […]
Score Plateau: 93 and Above It’s hard to call 93 a “plateau.” Most shooters would love to be able to say they had plateaued at 93. But the sad truth is, few shooters have the commitment to do what it takes to get here. Because they never put in the time on their game to […]
Score Plateau: 83 You are here because you have a perfect gun mount that happens consistently without thought. You have stopped looking at the gun in the setup and down the gun during the shot. And you have stopped cutting your eyes looking for the target. This is where the journey of learning how to […]
Score Plateau: 75 You are here because 75 percent of the targets in the round can be shot with three inches of lead or less, and the size of your pattern makes up for many mounting and pointing errors. But if you have learned to move and mount the gun, you won’t spend much time here. […]
You are here because you have fallen in love with the game and you can’t get enough of it. Up to now, you have just been playing around with different things. While you can hit some of the targets some of the time, something is missing in your game: consistency. And no matter how much you […]
Great performers are not born with some innate ability that predisposes them to be able to be great at anything. They all have spent thousands of hours doing what it is that they do. But each person became great by the commitment in time, money, and effort to practice deliberately; to deliberately improve to world-class […]
Some think if they would just try harder, they will improve and eventually find the “holy grail” of consistency. But try as they may, that holy grail turns into a nosegay of excuses that simply masks their lack of commitment to ask for help or their fear of what others might think or say about […]
Here’s a little-known fact: shooters who can move and mount the gun learn as much as three times faster than those who don’t! Said another way, people who refuse to learn to move and mount the gun learn as much as three times slower. The choice is yours. Some might think that just doing something more would set the […]
We are finding out that practice is perhaps the most valuable tool in our game of shooting a moving target with a shotgun. At the same time, it’s the most wasted tool. Shooters shoot a lot and think they are practicing, but all they are really practicing is loading the gun and calling “pull.” You […]
Our research shows that a person’s mindset is the greatest single determining factor that opens the door to higher and higher levels of performance because it must be learned. The majority of shooters have what is called a “fixed mindset,” where their main goal is to look good. When offered either a hard course that […]
In his book Peak, Anders Ericsson mentions that there are three myths associated with skill and improving skill. We think it’s important to talk about them. That way, you can be aware of them and not fall prey to them, because they will kill the learning process in your game. The myths are: 1. Our abilities […]
You become what you repeatedly do, and eventually, you become what you remember. How you file those things in your brain as positive or negative will determine who you become. In their book Be A Player, Lynn Marriott and Pia Nilsson share this about memory: “Psychological research has shown that humans have a 3:1 negativity bias […]
Ask a room full of sporting clays shooters if they would like to be more consistent, and they’ll overrun you with enthusiastic responses. Few, if any, really know why they are so inconsistent. They’re good on some days and not so good on others. But there seems to be no real consistent rhyme or reason […]
Our intuition persuades us to dedicate stretches of time to the single-minded repetitive practice of things we want to master. We’ve been led to believe that the regimen of massed practice is essential for building mastery of a skill or learning new knowledge. But it fails the long-term test. These intuitions are compelling and hard […]
Remember that the most successful students take charge of their own learning and follow a simple but disciplined strategy. You may not have been taught how to do this, but you can do it and will likely surprise yourself with the results. Embrace the fact that significant learning is often difficult. You will experience setbacks, […]
In Houston, we’re fortunate that we have quite a few clubs to go to. But if you practice at the same place every time, you need to vary it as much as you can. I recommend mixing it up as much as possible – not necessarily practicing pairs. But practice singles, playing the game, and […]
Do you want to push yourself? I encourage you to go and shoot every tournament you have the time and money for. I’ve realized that this is one of the main reasons top shooters are top shooters. Yes, they see the same targets delivered in so many different ways: the speeds, lines, backgrounds, and angles […]
As you go on the journey of shooting single targets, you work on perfecting your game through repetition. You work on being critical; not about whether you broke the target, but how the target was broken. You can then begin to attach similar links of movement to certain shots. Linking these movements allows the brain to begin […]
I’m intrigued by the concept of the brain combining parts of different circuits and coming up with a synchronous circuit that will break a specific target. I’ve never really looked at the fact that the brain might combine parts of two or three different circuits to do this. Think about how many variables in sporting […]
Shooting singles in different breakpoints is so critical, and playing the game is so powerful! Playing the game – shooting single targets in your predicted breakpoint – forces you to recall the circuit that your brain knows will break that target the way you want it broken. It’s based on your visual movie in your […]
The vivid preload is so essential, and it comes from making the post-shot routine a habit. People don’t do a post-shot routine, which is the part of building performance that’s wasted the most. The brain has done a miraculous thing by putting together the circuit to break a 50-yard chandelle or a 25-to-30-yard quartering away […]
The more you get involved with the mechanical process, the more you get in the way of what the brain does the best. And it does it in an amazingly short amount of time. Remember: the anticipation circuit has the ability to change human behavior as it is happening. That is, as long as you […]
Allowing the brain to recall opens up all the subconscious databases. It allows you to concentrate more of your focus on the target when your visual process is vivid. The more vivid your visual process is, the easier it is for the brain to choose and sync up the different parts of different circuits. It does this with amazing […]
On a recent Coaching Hour, I talked about how there’s less emphasis on the mechanics of the shot back in the cage and more emphasis on the last 15 percent of how I wanted the shot to go, as well as where I wanted the shot to be taken. As we were practicing at Westside, I […]
As professional coaches, we must define where a person’s ability to focus is and what they perceive when they shoot. That way we can coach them to the next level of perception and performance. In fact, we’ve discovered that as people move through the classes and become more and more consistent, they begin to see […]
As you from E through B class, you’ll practice more singles than pairs. You’ll be working on your move and mount and moving your breakpoints so you can begin to play shape on the first bird in a pair. You’ll be making the trip to the second bird shorter and more efficient. This is a […]
Your attitude and reaction to your practice and tournament results begin to build a file in the memory part of your brain that you will be able to call on in future pressure situations while competing. If you always react in a positive way (regardless of result) then you will build a habit that you can depend […]
The barrel is part of the picture, and you can’t “unsee” the barrel! Once a shooter accepts the muzzle as part of the picture and, through the mounting drills, gets their brain to deal with it and keep it in the periphery, life as a shotgun shooter gets really fun. However, until then, it is a […]
The reason shooters practice a lot and don’t get better is they are not practicing correctly. “Correctly” means something different depending on the level of their game. The shooters between levels C and E will need to train mostly on singles, mounting and moving the gun, and shooting the six basic trajectories: left-to-right, right-to-left, crossing, […]
I was watching a NASCAR event on TV the other day that had a lot of collisions. One occurred with 20 laps to go. As the pace car came out to restart the race, the announcers talked about the drivers weaving in and out, trying to heat up their tires. They went on and on […]
Regardless of the outcome, any shot without a prediction and an execution based on the prediction will not make it to long-term memory. It will remain in your short-term memory, which is an expert at forgetting what it just did! Search for “building long-term memory” in the Knowledge Vault and see what you find. The more […]
Practice is not about breaking the targets. It is about preloading the shot and deliberately firing the chunks sequentially. This makes it easier for the brain to anticipate ahead of the present and perform the skill without thinking. The most important and most wasted part of improvement is what and how you practice. The overwhelming number of shooters who […]
If you practice deliberately and with a detailed preload of the movie of the shot coming together before you close the gun and call “pull,” then, through repetition, the brain can recognize the exact skill you are planning to use and can anticipate ahead of every action in the sequence. This allows for you to […]
When you have been shooting well in the past, nothing matters and everything is quiet between your ears. But how does this “not thinking” occur? When you are shooting well, it’s as if the brain already knows what it needs to do to hit the targets and it just happens without thought. But how does […]
Our research has shown us that almost every thought a shooter has while performing will eventually bring focus and attention back to the barrel and/or the lead. In some instances, the omnipresence of the seemingly uninterrupted stream of random thoughts turns into an avalanche of eventually negative “gibberish.” If you heard someone else say it, […]
When shooting your round of 25/25 on skeet, there was no argument in your brain! This allows you to access your long-term memory and not think while the target is in the air. We see shooters who are trying to not see the barrel or trying to not think. They continue to fail because you can’t not think. And […]
Until every shot you take is first a prediction of when where and how you are about to break the next target, and then the shot mirrors that prediction, you are not building long-term memory or skill! What you see when shooting a moving target all happens in the periphery, and everything you are aware […]
When I am shooting well, things really look the same to me. Everything is in slow motion like the ShotKam videos in our Knowledge Vault! The futility of trying to see what someone else sees comes from those who are looking for the magic bullet. News flash: there ain’t no magic bullet! What you see must […]
As I said in an earlier post, when I am shooting well and really in sync with the targets, everything looks almost the same and seems to be moving in slow motion. The mental pictures just come as a flashback when viewing the look targets. It just happens and it really feels great. I just […]
I have 95 to 98 percent of my focus – awareness, attention, thought, intent – on the target and enough awareness of the muzzle to know the target is behind where it pointed, and that the muzzle speed is the same as the target’s speed. That’s when I send the shot. When I have been […]
The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new! Many people would learn from their mistakes if they would stop making excuses! The quote of the day: “More people would learn from their mistakes if they weren’t so busy denying them!” If you don’t […]
A range owner in North Carolina shot my gun and instantly wanted me to cut his Guerini so it would fit and shoot like mine. So, he sent it to me and I cut it to fit me and sent it back. He has had the same result, and everyone he shows it to is […]
The biggest common reaction to shooting a flat-shooting gun is the shooter’s pictures are reciprocal on left-to-right and right-to-left targets and the sight pictures make so much sense! I shot with a shooter yesterday who had a Beretta 680 12ga with Briley screw chokes. The gun was too short and the comb was too high. At […]
Rib height has little to do with how well you will shoot one gun over another. In the end, it is the relationship between the rib height and the shape and height of the comb and where your cheek softly and comfortably touches the comb. Most shooters are wrestling with trying to fit their bodies […]
One of the reasons you can’t learn from any book or coach is that you must see how these emotions and circumstances manifest themselves in you. It is not the end of recognizing the problem that you need to know to avoid the problem. It is the beginning of the real breakdown that you must […]
You hear a lot about gun fit and follow-through. While they are important, here is where we have come to after thousands of shooters and 55,000 hours each over 26 years as professional coaches: If the sight picture is correct and the muzzle speed is the same as the target’s speed and the gun mount is […]
The body eventually turns back into itself. Learning is about fulfilling your innate potential. It requires challenging homeostasis and taking control of your destiny. What does the shot look like at every moment? Mental Representations (MRs) allow for the access of huge bits of data in an instant. Experts have higher quality and greater quantity […]
You must give the task your full attention. You must push yourself past your comfort zone. Finding the barrier is critical for improving. You must isolate what keeps you from getting better. Coming at a barrier from a different direction is the key to getting past it. This is where an experienced coach can pay […]
The brain sees skill as a pattern: a series of skills that have been repeated enough times so that they happen without thought. At this point, the skill moves to long-term memory to free up more short-term memory. When you perform this skill enough times in long-term memory with other skills, you develop a pattern. This […]
We see shooters who are practicing just trying to break the target. When the broken target is a result of a detailed preload and happens just like the preload, you can believe it and begin to trust it. You cannot trust what you cannot see in your mind’s eye. Your performance depends more on your […]
Creating long-term memory is defining mental representations: a visual image we see when a phrase is introduced to our brain. Long-term memory enables the brain to process enormous amounts of data in a fraction of a second. The pattern recognition via repetitions in deep practice makes the patterns more and more obvious to the brain. […]
I went to range Thursday night and shot three boxes. While I missed some easy shots, I stuck with the program and did not get emotionally involved. I went back to range on Saturday and shot seven boxes and it all came back. While I had a couple of hiccups, all in all, I really […]
To do anything, the brain must have a mental representation of what it is about to do! The better the mental representation, the better the shot. The better the shot, the better the mental representation, and so on and so on. It becomes a virtual circle when you predict and commit to the prediction! This is […]
Deliberate practice is about predicting what you are about to do and committing to do just that. The more detailed the prediction, the clearer it becomes for both sides of the brain to be comfortable with the task at hand. Then they become so much better at doing what you want them to do because […]
Just like you cannot “not think,” you cannot shoot consistently without being aware of the barrel. It’s there. It’s part of it, albeit a small awareness. Trying to feel your way through the shot and not see the barrel is futile, and establishing an awareness of the muzzle in the periphery is an individual evolution. […]
Accepting the variability swing to swing and shot to shot was a huge understanding for me as a shooter and as a coach! Knowing that I can’t make the same perfect move, mount, and shot every time I call “pull” allows me to let my subconscious take care of setup, as well as when and […]
At the end of the day, the biggest mistake we see athletes make is a lack of a detailed preload of the movie of how they are committing to make the shot come together. It is the leading cause for performance ceilings being lower than athletes’ abilities and never consistently reaching the zone. When the athletes understand […]
The biggest mistake we see other athletes and coaches make is they think it’s what they see that makes them good. As chunking occurs, the brain learns what to ignore. This allows them to see more clearly. A shooter’s ability to see and perform at higher and higher levels has more to do with what they have trained […]
How does the brain create the zone? And what is actually happening when you are in the zone, which in turn allows for more people to trust it and experience it? It is about repetition and anticipating. Using this and other research has enabled us to be so much more effective in coaching shooters, golfers, fishermen, […]
“Like all weak men, he laid an exaggerated stress on not changing one’s mind.” ― W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage
• “When you get to a fork in the road, take it.” • “It gets late early around here.” • “A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.” • “The future ain’t what it used to be.” • “Ninety percent of this game is half mental.” • “I really didn’t say everything I said.” • “You […]
“Regardless of how many times you are knocked down, keep standing!” “If you don’t know where you’re going, you might end up someplace else.” – Yogi Berra “No improvement happens without change. For every change, there is a price. The value is in the commitment!” – Vicki Ash KEEP STANDING Unless you reach for something beyond what you have already […]
“Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity. Pride is the virtue of a foolish person.” – Rick Rigsby “You are what you repeatedly do. Excellence should be a habit, not an act.” – Aristotle Wisdom can come to you in the most unusual of places… a lot of times through failure! There […]
Failure is inevitable and is the most feared confrontation of most people’s lives. But at the same time, it is a necessary part of skill-building. I said something the other day in a way that I have never said before. “When correcting from a failure, you are actually explaining to your brain in more specific terms […]
Wisdom can come to you in the most unusual of places – a lot of times through failure! When you combine wisdom with optimism, you can get the perfect storm of rapid skill development because you finally realize that failing is the key that opens the door to doing something better and better. Optimism comes […]
In studying skill-building we have come across something that we think you will find interesting as we did. The Three Myths of Skill-Building “Skill is Genetic.” “She is a natural.” “He was just born with a natural ability that few possess.” While being tall can be an advantage in playing basketball or first base in […]
