The Coaching Hour is tonight and we will be beginning a discussion on “deliberate practice” and its effect on higher levels of performance. Last month we began this discussion and instead of an hour, it went an hour and a half. We expect tonight to be the same. I’m on my sixth or seventh listen […]
We are just back from the National Shooting Sports Foundation where Brian, Vicki, and I did some tips that NSSF will be putting up on all mediums – Facebook, Twitter, etc. Some of them were the longer tips like I have done in the past, but many of them are a new shorter format for […]
Perhaps the most overlooked section of the Knowledge Vault is Coaching Hours! We have been doing a one-hour conference call every month since November 2001 and they are all in the section. First, listen to or read March 2015 to understand what skill is and how it is built, then go to the most recent […]
On our most recent Coaching Hour, we talked about patterning your shotgun first to make sure that the barrels are regulated correctly and then for the point of impact. We also talked about Hurricane Harvey and how we are doing, as well as having a quiet eye when calling for the bird. We are all […]
Be sure to check out the August 2017 Coaching Hour podcast where we talk about how your vision evolves as you train and your game progresses. We are just back from Lehigh Valley Sporting Clays in Pennsylvania and we had a great clinic with a lot of learning. We talked about training a lot and […]
The top shooters never have to “check the beads” to see if they are lined up. Their mount is perfect every time, whether shooting gun up or down. Keeping their eyes on the target is a given and the muzzle is always in the periphery. They know where it is pointed without looking at it […]
As you become skillful, you enable the anticipation circuit in your brain to correct something in the shot you have done that will cause a miss while the shot is happening and before the shot is taken. This is when the zone becomes a part of your performance. Remember, this circuit has the ability to […]
Your anticipation circuit in your brain can anticipate ahead of where you are. And it is in constant use while you are awake. The better you are at something, the farther in front of where you are the brain can anticipate. This circuit has the ability to alter human behavior as it is happening.
We never really grow up; we just learn how to act in public!
Consistency and confidence cannot be practiced; they are the residue of practice.
Skill is what happens when you are not thinking. As a habit turns into a skill through repetition and evaluation and correction and repetition again, the more your skill improves. And the better your skill, the less you must think about what you are doing. This frees up so much more focus for the target […]
It is so important to learn the fundamentals so well that they happen at 95 percent efficiency 100 percent of the time. You can’t be thinking while performing. As Vicki says, “thinking while performing is a distraction!”
The better your habits, the more available focus there is for the target. Duh! Another breakthrough for me to explain available focus: Focus is a see-saw effect between the muzzle and the target. You can’t give a target more focus than you have available to give. Just like shooting well is not an achievable goal, […]
Don’t forget to listen to the new Coaching Hour podcast, Thursday, July 20th! Topics include: – Encountering the Voice, Addressing the Ego – The Differences between Sub-Gauge and Main Courses – Respect for the Practice – Cataract Surgery, Respecting Your Time in the Box …and much more!
Fear comes in because you are not yourself in a tournament. Your body does not know how to act and your brain doesn’t know how to control your body. The reason you are not yourself is that you are not ready to be the you that you want to be… expectation!
When shooting well becomes a result, rather than something you can practice, it immediately eliminates the frustration of not shooting well. In turn, this kills the goal of just shooting well. It is something that cannot be defined and thus cannot be a goal. It is merely a wish from the conscious part of the […]
The journey is moving through the threshold concepts with determination to conquer them, not to shoot well. Everything you seek is a result of what you have conquered, not something you can practice!
I did not say it was your fault; I said I was blaming you!
Being honest with yourself is the thing that opens the door to learning. Stop making excuses for not shooting as well as you think you should. “Excuses are the crutches of the untalented!”
If we could just get shooters to stop trying to break the targets and focus on improving their move and seeing the bird behind where the barrel is pointing, they would instantly shoot better. When you try you get in your own way, you are not building habits. Nothing is a skill until it becomes […]
Stop running away from failing and face the fact that you are responsible for the misses and the hits. Trying not to miss causes the learning to stop. You learn more from your misses than the hits. And the sad fact is that shooters are running away from the very thing that they must have […]
We constantly see shooters who, for whatever reason, keep putting the gun too close to the target. And we spend 95 percent of our time getting the gun out of the way of the eyes.
When you finally stop chasing the targets and putting the gun in the way, you will begin to be able to slow the targets down. Two things will happen. First, you will begin to hit more targets. But most importantly, the cause for the miss will become more obvious. You will be able to implement […]
The frustration comes to a head in the journey when the corrections you use are not breaking the targets but it looks right.
The solution is simple. But sometimes it’s a bitter pill because the first person you have to blame is yourself. The helping hand you are looking for is at the end of your own arm.
Everyone is looking for a quick fix. Nobody said the road to consistently higher and higher scores was a freeway!
I am consistently amazed at how shooters at all levels view what they are trying to do to break the target and where they look for consistency and improved performance. Simply watching the Clay Target Kill Shot Reviews and doing the three-bullet and flashlight drills will solve so many problems and improve performance dramatically fast. […]
The apparent “problems” you encounter along the way in building your habits are less dependent on a certain target you are missing. This is important to note. The issue is more of a breakdown in a fundamental within your game. That is why having an experienced coach view your game on a consistent basis becomes […]
Trying too hard encourages evaluation during performance…and nothing good will happen! Evaluation is a necessary step in getting better. But the evaluation process begins with the last shot you fire in practice or on game day.
The journey is moving through the habit, building concepts with determination to conquer them, not shoot well. Eventually, it’s more important to just go shoot and become yourself, regardless of whether it’s at practice or a tournament. Remember, your brain is accustomed to running your body based on you being you. And when you try […]
Everything you do on game day has got to become like brushing your teeth! In the beginning, you could not even find your mouth. Now you can stick your foot in it without even trying! Then you became fascinated with your reflection in the mirror and missed your mouth completely. Then you could hit your […]
We see shooters becoming someone other than who they are when they try too hard on game day. That really reveals how much fear is present, which creates evaluation while performing. In turn, that creates muzzle awareness in the shot in practice, and even more on game day as you try harder!
Getting better is about building habits. Nothing is a skill until it is a habit. We see this in many different places along the journey as you complete the habit-building along the way. Each and every thing you do on game day must be a habit and in the automaticity part of the brain. In […]
Shooting as many tournaments as possible is so important, regardless of outcome. You just got to go shoot. You have to have shot so many tournaments that shooting another one is just like having a hamburger or driving a car. Your experience allows for you to become you in a tournament.
You can’t be someone else. If you become someone else, you can no longer become you. This is where the struggle is. Imagine what your brain is thinking as you go to the shoot and through expectation, you begin to put pressure on yourself to perform. Instead of relaxing and just shooting (the person your […]
It is not as much how well you can shoot, but how many times you have shot well while being yourself. That’s what really matters. This could be the greatest breakthrough I have had in coaching performance with a shotgun… or in life itself.
Your attitude in practice is so very important in building a game. And that is what you are doing: you are building a game. Setbacks are determined by your attitude about them, not what they really are. The problem is not that there are problems; the problem is thinking otherwise and thinking that having a […]
It occurs to me today the reason why trying too hard or trying harder doesn’t work: You must build a persona of who you are in competition to have a peak performance.
As we travel the country, we see over and over that the majority of shooters still think that getting the lead right will lead to more consistency. Then some say it’s “the six inches between their ears” that keeps them from progressing. Others say “I’m really not that competitive of a person.” Some justify their […]
Rather than being shocked or relieved when the target breaks, the best shooters are shocked when it doesn’t break because they are so committed to a certain sight picture before they even close their gun to call “pull”!
“I did shoot my new Mossberg 930 sporting. It was hard for me to believe. I have a Benelli Super Sport custom shop, and a Beretta A 400 multi-target ACS. I took your 930 out, and on my first shooting at wobble trap, hit 23 out of 25 with no malfunctions. It is a natural […]
A giant step in the right direction to become more consistent is to do the three-bullet drill to train your brain to accept the muzzles in the periphery and get used to what the sight pictures really look like. This will make it so much easier for you to visualize what you are about to […]
There are two things we see that separate the top shooters in both skeet and sporting. First, the ability to visualize exactly what the shot is going to look like before they even load the gun. And second, how comfortable they are in the competitive environment. So how do you ascend to the levels of […]
Your focus improves as your habits improve. The amount you have used that specific habit in competition in turn determines how comfortable you are when you are competing. I was in a shoot-off with Olympic skeet shooter Matt Dryke at the first Beretta championships held in our country in 1987. While waiting to shoot off, […]
The beginning shooter must train themselves to develop good habits that they can depend on when they are performing. Nothing is a skill until it becomes a habit. Hockey legend Wayne Gretzky said, “We are all creatures of habit. The better your habits are, the better they hold up under pressure.” Tennis great Martina Navratilova […]
Before you go practice, always look in the Knowledge Vault and review companion videos in the sporting clays section of presentations you are about to practice. Then look at clay kill shot reviews of targets you are going to practice. You will automatically get more out of your practice.
Through purposeful practice, the top shooters have assembled a mental library of what it really looks like when they break a target, which allows them to send a detailed visual to their brains. When they call “pull,” they already know what it will look like. Their brains respond in kind over and over and over. […]
Why are so many shooters so confused about why they can’t get the gun where they already know it is supposed to be? Well, our experience shows that top shooters can visualize exactly what they are about to do to break the targets in vivid detail. They visualize it as a movie with the shots […]
Here’s what we learned from training and evaluating an eight-week skeet league in late summer and early fall of 2016… If you are not doing practice drills #102 and #102 from quick tips, watching the Kill Shot Reviews on skeet, trap, or sporting clays, or watching the Kill Shot Reviews on hunting game birds, you […]
On a recent Coaching Hour, our friend Dean Troutte said the following: “You are either in the cage thinking about what you are doing with the gun or you are downrange with the targets. You can’t be in two places at once. Where you are is your decision. So you have got to have everything […]
There are a lot of different perceptions about what really happens when you shoot at a moving target with a shotgun. And there are even more different approaches to getting the gun in front of the target than you can imagine. But there is a real difference between the shooters at the top and the […]
Check out the September 2016 Coaching Hour podcast! Sleep is really important. And not just the night before it starts; as much as a week before, and sometimes more than that. Things you do off the course can have a huge effect on your performance, hidden from most of us. But when you approach them […]
The first and most critical step in dealing with fear is to be honest with yourself and understand yourself well enough to recognize a negative thought when it surfaces. The second step is to ask yourself “Is that TRUE?” The answer is always “No,” because it has not happened yet! DUH!
When we don’t perform well, we typically focus on our mechanical performance. But the mental mistake that may have contributed to the poor shots is too often overlooked. The game within the game is to stick with your system, even though it is not producing the results you want or expected. You can’t focus on […]
After you miss, you can’t alter what has happened. But you can influence what will happen next. Get in the Knowledge Vault and watch the Kill Shot Reviews. You will better be able to visualize how the shot comes together.
The key to success is not to eliminate mistakes. Mistakes are going to happen for everyone. The key is in controlling our reactions to those mistakes. The most destructive force you can unleash on the course is anger. An impulsive reaction against a perceived injustice is never prudent behavior! Anger makes us stupid.
When expectation is equal to your ability, great things happen. That would be where confidence comes from. This begins with competence. And eventually, you become what you remember!
It occurred to me today that it is not about training your center vision to stay on the target. It is about training your periphery to accept the gun and, through minimum movement, not switch primary to it. We are wired to see movement in our periphery. In turn, it directs the primary vision to […]
There are some great posts in the forum! I just got back from a small vacation and am back to the grind. The Advance Classes are already filling up so if you are interested, please call the office. I’ve had a few shooters calling and expressing their frustration on rabbits. So, listen up. Nine out […]
Your determination to do the same thing the same way every time you step into the stand, regardless of the situation, is the first step to training the competition circuit in the brain. What we are now understanding is that shooters shoot to have fun and enjoy the relaxation and camaraderie that comes from being […]
Being able to “turn it off and on” during a competition is critical for accessing the correct part of the brain to find the zone. Check out the last Coaching Hour for more about this topic.
In our Coaching Hour last Tuesday, we discussed several things: What happens to you physically and chemically when you react to pressure. Why coming out of the gun between shots of a pair is an advantage How you compete is a circuit in your brain and you train it in practice and competition when you […]
I am beginning to understand that when the shot is easier to visualize, the preload becomes more vivid. And it is easier to switch the subconscious on and the conscious off. Why? Because it’s easier to BELIEVE!
Well, we are on our way to Maine to visit Scarborough Fish and Game. I am really excited about the next few days. It will be our first time at the facility, and from what I have heard, there are a lot of shooters there. It will be interesting to see what their perception is […]
When you watch the Kill Shot Reviews with your mouse on the pause button, it makes them interactive. We now have scientific proof that viewing them will improve your score! Check out the video on the home page and I will show you how. Every day we have shooters emailing us about their improved performances […]
I talked to a shooter yesterday who is complaining about missing right-to-left shots, claiming his right eye would take over and make him miss behind. He is a lefty and was trying dots with aperture in them and he could not close an eye. My question to him was “How long have you been shooting […]
Check out the forum for some great posts! We’re on our way to Ohio for a few days to coach and we’re looking forward to going to Maine in a few weeks. We continue to receive performance emails from shooters participating in our skeet and sporting studies and they are all extremely positive. Shooters are […]
In the coming month, we will be making more sporting clay Kill Shot Reviews. These will include a wider variety of shots, closer as well as farther, teal, and rabbits, to give tournament shooters a wider variety of presentations to view to get ready for tournaments or practice. Stay tuned!
What the research has shown in the past is listing the distance makes shooters concentrate on the lead, not how the shot comes together. Research further shows that how the shot comes together and gun speed being the same as target speed is infinitely more important than exact lead. If you will notice after the […]
Amazing things are happening to shooters who are watching the Kill Shot Reviews. Especially those who are viewing them interactively with the mouse on the pause button. It doesn’t matter whether it is skeet, trap, sporting, or wingshooting. When viewed from an interactive standpoint, performance soars. Several perfect scores have been the result of viewing […]
There have been some great forum topics, so check them out. If you are not looking at the clay kill shot reviews before you go practice or shoot a tournament, you should. Our skeet study shows that shooters who watched them and did the three-bullet and flashlight drills before they went out to shoot their […]
I introduced the clay kill shot review to two shooters recently, and they could not stop watching it. It was as if they were instantly transformed into better shooters. Today we are going to do the KSR with the mouse on the pause button. Then we’ll go shoot to see what happens. In our first […]
I’m still baffled by the number of confused shooters who are trying to get the gun ahead of the bird and not see the barrel! When I ask them how they visualize that they are dumbfounded. So many shooters intentionally put the gun in the way of the eyes seeing the target and where it […]
If you want to participate in our skeet study, email us and ask to be included. Be specific. You will be expected to go to the study site and do the drills, go shoot two rounds of skeet and report your scores and the amount of time you spent doing the drills each week for […]
Vicki and I were practicing on a range in Montana in a pretty good shifting wind and were both shooting well. Targets were inkballing in the altitude with mod chokes. On a quick quartering bird from the left with the trap about 8 yards left and 5 yards forward, I called for the bird and […]
Please don’t let the rain come down! Well, our field is still underwater at American and we are teaching at Greater Houston and Sealy at Super Dave’s place. Hopefully, the rain will slack off and our field will soon dry out so we can be business as normal. We are off to Montana and will […]
Hi all, We’ve been gone a lot over the last 40 days, and between traveling and the flood I’ve neglected my blog… but the “Pac is back!” I have some exciting news to share with all of you. When viewing the Kill Shot Reviews, use your mouse to click the pause button when you think […]
We have completed the second eight-week study on skeet shooters. They were asked to watch the skeet Kill Shot Review and do the flashlight drill and three-bullet drill every time before going out to shoot. Three of the 17 shot a few times but did not view the video or do the drills. The shooters […]
We have read several studies about why people do recreational sports and how many of them seek coaching. While the number of people seeking shooting instruction is definitely increasing, the reason why people do recreational sports intrigued us most. In a recent study in UK Sports Coaching, researchers referred to the fact that everyone has […]
Success has everything to do with the frequency and duration of tasking. The quest for competency is really a driving force for why people do a sport. But competence alone is not the driver. There is more and more evidence that shows people have three psychological needs that will influence their motivation to do sport: […]
Here’s the reason why trying harder doesn’t work: you must build a persona of who you are in competition to have a peak performance. You can do this for 2.5 hours a week for five to eight years, or you can do it for 10 to 15 hours a week for three to five years. […]
Helping Wingshooters Improve We spent the last week training Texas Parks and Wildlife staff to use our Knowledge Vault videos and data to begin their journey of improving shooting proficiency in this country’s wingshooters. Vicki, Brian, and I trained 14 trainers to teach the OSP system for three days… and man, were their eyes opened. […]
There are just certain things that you must face and go through such as dropping the last bird on a station or letting fear get into your game in any number of ways. Watching the kill shot reviews while being determined to make every shot stable at the end will solve most of them. Make […]
Don’t let your mouth write a check your shooting can cash!
“Shooting from behind the bird and looking at the bird down the barrel are both silly!” – Ignacio Rodriguez
I spent the morning with David and Emily Stewart shooting spots for their ShotKam website and had a ball doing them. I got to tell the world about how just looking at the ShotKam shots will actually make you a better shooter and will really slow the birds down. Then I got to shoot with […]
At South Florida Shooting Club from March 17th through the 27th, and without exception, every gun I have picked up is too high to shoot anywhere close to where the shooters are looking. On top of that, the shooters don’t have a clue what it is supposed to look like when it really fits. Ask […]
I saw a shooter with a Syren that was – you guessed it – too high and too long for her. If they would just leave the Monte Carlo off the stock and thin the comb, that gun would fit a lot more people.
It’s the third week of our Advance School. Being surrounded by shooters who really want to advance their games is both invigorating and inspiring. Conclusions that I am drawing from these 21 days will follow in the next several blogs. Here’s today’s thought: I am beginning to conclude that a person’s ability to hit the […]
Well, the first Advance Class is over, and what a success it was! We had great weather, and of course world-class targets. Again, shooters are continually amazed at how proficient the anticipation circuit is and how well it works, provided the shooter maintains focus on the target and matches gun speed with target speed. We […]
I’m just back from the San Antonio rodeo junior shootout. Man, what an organized shoot, and what a privilege to be there and talk to the shooters. As usual, I saw young shooters in such contorted positions making moves that more resemble a robot that is horribly out of time and sync. Crouched. Leaned over. […]
“Great things never came from comfort zones.” — Barry Sanders, who tweeted this during the Super Bowl
If you are not willing to be seen as STUPID, nothing great will ever happen to you!
Think about how much focus you could put on the target if you did not have to worry about what you are doing with the gun when mounting it. I long for the day when your mounting process is automatic: the only part of the gun you are aware of is the muzzle and the […]
The anticipation circuit in the brain can alter behavior as it is happening. And the better your moves are, the easier you’re making it on the circuit to correct! When you give in to evaluation, however, learning and performance stop because you are no longer anticipating, but reacting! When you give in to circumstances, learning […]
We’re back in Florida and looking forward to the next three weekends. South Florida Shooting Club today through Tuesday. Sarasota Gun Club Wednesday through Sunday, and OK Corral Monday through Sunday. Then home again on Monday, Feb. 1st! We had a great Coaching Hour last Monday so check it out on the Knowledge Vault. Look […]
I had a conversation with Jeff Wolfe the other day and he made a comment that I want to share with you all. We were talking about being able to forget the bad shots, and he said “you have to be able to forget the good ones, too!” Hanging on to the good shots and […]
I had a question today about mounting quickly and not inserting and stopping the gun. My answer is as follows: Have you done the three-bullet drill? What you are describing is symptomatic of looking down the barrel and not seeing the bird behind the barrel. The three-bullet drill is designed to imprint the two sight […]
We find that to improve you must change something. And shooters who can move and mount the gun without thinking about it or looking at it can make changes so much more quickly than those who can’t – in my opinion, two to three times faster than those who shot with a mounted gun! When […]
We are at the Dallas Safari convention today and tomorrow doing seminars. And we’re excited to show the new HD ShotKam footage we have shot on clays, doves, and quail. We never know what we are going to talk about until Vicki polled the crowd and then we go into what they are interested in. […]
