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Brian Enos's Forums... Maku mozo!

Why do we have good shooting days and bad?


PaulW

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Seriously though guys, the answer is a combination of all these things for some, and the total lack of these things for others. I can tell you for me when it's easy, I shoot well. When it's hard, it's more difficult to shoot well. If I'm good at something it's easy.....

At some point it becomes a little mash of skill, experience and confidence. You can overcome a small lack of one of these items if you have an overabundance of the others.

But the point is really how you measure shooting well. Is it by points dropped or times, hit factors or winning. For me it is all of these.

Maybe it's different for everyone. If I can't identify what causes a certain performance, there is no way I can predict which way it's gonna go. Maybe we should start paying more attention to these conditions before good/bad happens rather than after?

Back in the old days when Benos and I were shooting or talking about shooting every second of the day, I identified that skill starts the whole thing for me. If I was skilled I'd shoot well, then finish well then be motivated to practice and improve further my skill set.

Can't talk for Brian, but I bet he has lots of this info somewhere around here.

The catch is everyone understands this issue in different ways. Brian liked the matches to test his theories developed in practice. I truly believe he enjoyed the practice more than the match. I used the matches to test whether I was as good as I wanted to be and where I needed improvement. And whether I could shoot well under pressure. I do, so I like that situation/environment. None of that has diminished in 30 years of shooting at the National level.

This discussion is unchanged from 1979 when I first started shooting with Big Daddy. It's like religion, some people need little discussion of it of it to get by and others need a constant barrage to maintain their interest. I don't feel either angle is wrong. I do feel it's most important to identify the skill inadequacies first and diminish those in practice and training. After the technique and skill are in place, it's much easier to be confident and good under pressure.

Then again, I may be wrong.....

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That about sums it up for me, i need to work at my weaknesses, build my skills and my confidence. That will = less pressure and the results i am after. Or at the least mucho bettero finetos. Lmao

Thanks

Edited by a matt
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"At some point it becomes a little mash of skill, experience and confidence. You can overcome a small lack of one of these items if you have an overabundance of the others."

That sounds like a different version of Bassham's 3 circles.

The word "small" is pretty important there too, it seems. Skill, experience and zero confidence couldn't be much better than experience, confidence and zero skill.

Great stuff Rob. Thanks for taking the time.

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  • 1 month later...

I find that if I am not in the right mental state it's very hard to clear my mind. A distracted conscious mind can not function the way it needs to. I was dry firing yesterday and could not clear my mind of the bad day at work. The more I thought about getting it out of my head the worse it got. The trouble about not thinking about something is that you are thinking about it.

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I feel its all a matter of perspective. Being individuals who thrive on competition there are probably not a lot of things we will ever settle on as being "good enough". Looking up at the higher level guys i think to myself, "wow, that guy was fast" but i bet they're consumed with the half dozen things they know they can do better. Shooting god or bad is narrow viewed.

sometime the journey is the destination

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Seriously though guys, the answer is a combination of all these things for some, and the total lack of these things for others. I can tell you for me when it's easy, I shoot well. When it's hard, it's more difficult to shoot well. If I'm good at something it's easy.....

At some point it becomes a little mash of skill, experience and confidence. You can overcome a small lack of one of these items if you have an overabundance of the others.

But the point is really how you measure shooting well. Is it by points dropped or times, hit factors or winning. For me it is all of these.

Maybe it's different for everyone. If I can't identify what causes a certain performance, there is no way I can predict which way it's gonna go. Maybe we should start paying more attention to these conditions before good/bad happens rather than after?

Back in the old days when Benos and I were shooting or talking about shooting every second of the day, I identified that skill starts the whole thing for me. If I was skilled I'd shoot well, then finish well then be motivated to practice and improve further my skill set.

Can't talk for Brian, but I bet he has lots of this info somewhere around here.

The catch is everyone understands this issue in different ways. Brian liked the matches to test his theories developed in practice. I truly believe he enjoyed the practice more than the match. I used the matches to test whether I was as good as I wanted to be and where I needed improvement. And whether I could shoot well under pressure. I do, so I like that situation/environment. None of that has diminished in 30 years of shooting at the National level.

This discussion is unchanged from 1979 when I first started shooting with Big Daddy. It's like religion, some people need little discussion of it of it to get by and others need a constant barrage to maintain their interest. I don't feel either angle is wrong. I do feel it's most important to identify the skill inadequacies first and diminish those in practice and training. After the technique and skill are in place, it's much easier to be confident and good under pressure.

Then again, I may be wrong.....

That is a great post Robbie. Thanks for coming in...

be

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I think it comes down to a lack of focus and our attempt to try and DO more than we really need to do.

That plus when I recognize I am having a good day I start to get excited and the mental game starts to get to me.

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