SEEING FASTER

[Red Ryder]

How do I teach my eyes to see faster? According to Brian Enos, you can only shoot as fast as your eyes can see. I want to "see" faster.

[StraightUp_OG]

You have to stop looking and just see.

[mhoosier]

Something that has helped me a bunch has been shooting trap/clay. They move fast and you have to use a target focus sight picture to get hits dependably. As my eyes get better at seeing all of that over a couple months, I've noticed an improvement with my pistol shooting as well.

[EngineerEli]

I feel like I am in a similar place, where the speed I can acquire my acceptable sight picture is what is holding me back. I would love to hear what people have to say about this!

[StraightUp_OG]

The mind can take in all that the eyes see and process the information at ~10 teraflops. What slows this process down is trying to consciously interpret the data. What I mean about "stop looking" is stop trying to understand what you are seeing and let your subconscious mind handle the processing. What slows us down is thinking.

When we are looking we are trying to shape the experience, by seeing we allow the experience to unfold in front of us as it is. It is not a matter of "seeing" faster it is a matter of removing conscious thought during the experience.

Stop looking and just see.

Edited November 14, 2013 by StraightUp_OG

[Jasonatlaw]

How do I teach my eyes to see faster? According to Brian Enos, you can only shoot as fast as your eyes can see. I want to "see" faster.

That reminds me of a line from Big Trouble in Little China Town. "I don't drive any faster than I can see..."

[Chris iliff]

The mind can take in all that the eyes see and process the information at ~10 teraflops. What slows this process down is trying to consciously interpret the data. What I mean about "stop looking" is stop trying to understand what you are seeing and let your subconscious mind handle the processing. What slows us down is thinking.

When we are looking we are trying to shape the experience, by seeing we allow the experience to unfold in front of us as it is. It is not a matter of "seeing" faster it is a matter of removing conscious thought during the experience.

Stop looking and just see.

This is great. ^^^^^^^^^

In addition, after 10 years I'd advise any newer shooter to do everything at the edge of their ability in practice. I mean all out to the Max, while still being safe. My other bit of advice would be that whenever you hear "go slow and get your hits" kick whoever said it right in the gonads, maybe twice.

I believe the your learning curve will be shorter if you practice like a raped ape. Caveat being you must also do what StraightUp_OG is saying above. In this environment you will start seeing what you need to see. Push push push in practice. In matches be efficient and shoot A's.

[Mig01]

That difference between looking and seeing reminds me of a documentary I saw about a year ago on the discovery channel, about how the brain functions while accomplishing certain tasks.

The guy they filmed was playing table tennis (ping pong). The narrator was explaining that things were happening too fast for the conscious mind to process. The player was acting and reacting at that pace of play without conscious thought. Practice creates neural pathways that enable the brain to control the action without intervention of the conscious mind, whose role become only strategic (such as aim for right corner since competitor is weaker from right side) .

I believe that speed shooting involves developing the same kind of skills where driving the gun, recognizing the acceptable sight picture and breaking the shot do not require involvement of the conscious mind anymore. The downside is that countless correct repetitions are required to reach that skill level.

[pjb45]

All that was written previously plus:

An excellent dry routine, consciously move your eyes before you you move the gun. I set up four or five targets all over my backyard--yes it does not bother me that my neighbors might see me.

Draw on your first target, move your eyes deliberately, focus on your next targets, then move the gun deliberately. Focus on your front sight. I do not try to go for speed I want my eyes to drive the entire process. I generally do this at slow to medium speed.

When you get to a match, your natural tendency will be to do everything quickly. Going slow in dry fire will not slow you down during a match. Your awareness during a match will improve.

The key is to build a sound foundation in dry fire which pays off during match time.

[SonOfSpartans]

This all reminds me of the scene from The Last Samurai. "You too many minds..............No mind"

It is true. Review in your mind after.......during just record/observe.

[bongmunoz]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mushin

I first read of this mental state in the Book of Five Rings, mushin no shin, but I didn't make the connection to being able to shoot faster until I read this post. Thanks!

[mercer]

I was told to take several deep breathes before beep. More oxygen to the brain = clearer picture?

[BSeevers]

I find first its better to do some physical exercises. Like moving your eye back and forth while driving from a taillight to a rock the road and back. Dryfire works too. Many other variations including I think Brian had a break through Stopping fan blades.

Now what people are saying in this thread is to perform at a high level you must shoot in the now, subconcious, no mind etc. We are wanting to get there asap, its the goal but unless you already are there, you must walk before running.

One of my early big break throughs was being asked Do you see the fire around the front sight? Of course I didn't. I knew I needed to see more. Do you?

[motosapiens]

All that was written previously plus:

An excellent dry routine, consciously move your eyes before you you move the gun. I set up four or five targets all over my backyard--yes it does not bother me that my neighbors might see me.

Draw on your first target, move your eyes deliberately, focus on your next targets, then move the gun deliberately. Focus on your front sight. I do not try to go for speed I want my eyes to drive the entire process. I generally do this at slow to medium speed.

When you get to a match, your natural tendency will be to do everything quickly. Going slow in dry fire will not slow you down during a match. Your awareness during a match will improve.

The key is to build a sound foundation in dry fire which pays off during match time.

Good points. I'm a lowly B, but I've made a lot of improvements in my eye/sight relationship in the last couple months. First thing I did was to correct (with glasses) a mild vision issue so i can see the front sight in clear and sharp focus. Then I started a little slower on my dry-fire routines, and consciously snapped my eyes to the next target and drew my focus towards the sights as they came into my field of view. Then I gradually speed up. It's starting to become a subconscious habit now, but I still train it specifically.

I don't know if it happens to everyone, but I find myself every few months getting into bad habits of focusing too much on improving speed, and not enough on making sure I'm really seeing what's going on. Dry-fire with focus and discipline helps alot. Dry-fire without focus and discipline is just going through the motions, and doesn't help me much at all.

[Sac Law Man]

I dont think in terms of seeing faster, but rather getting used to really pushing the transitions, driving the gun to the next target so fast that I have to force myself to get my eyes there first. If I dont, I feel like I am just point shooting shots in the direction of the target, and my hits reflect this. For me, its not pushing myself or trusting myself that get in my way..This may seem like putting the cart before the horse, but I feel driving the gun hard, gets my eyes there faster.

Heres another way to look at it.. Lets say you can train your eyes to see faster. What is fast though, and how do you measure it? What if your eyes are still slower than your ability to move the gun? Without using the speed of your transition as your guide, your playing catch up. You have to be able to tell your eyes how fast you need them to see. Really push the transitions and you will get used to seeing faster.

Edited January 2, 2014 by Sac Law Man

[CHA-LEE]

You need to put yourself into the proper conditions so you can get sufficient experience to test out different methods of observation. For example, If you go to the range and shoot 1 second splits, that is not the proper condition to train yourself on observing what is going on while cranking out .15 - .20 splits. You need to shoot .15 - .20 splits to be able to observe what is going on during that level of shooting speed. I know this may sound very basic but I think its a key point that many people overlook.

Do you think that race car drivers running around a track at 200mph are "Practicing" the same skills when driving around the same track at 20mph? No. That is not the same conditions as going 200mph.

[Mat Price]

Practice doesn't make perfect it makes permanent. For every rep you do wrong it will take something like 10 times as many to repair the damage of that wrong rep.

Before even thinking about going fast all your fundamental skills must be so ingrained at a sub conscious level that you are only calling on them to perform the action required. You cannot shoot with speed and your grip is not correct or your stance is not right.

This is a game of building blocks where each component builds on the other. People always tend to focus on shooting faster and seeing faster but fail to realize that is only a component of the skill. How about the ability to shoot from a stable platform aquire the sights go through the firing cycle ect at the speed it takes to shoot fast.

Unless you can make the fundamentals happen faster than you can pull the trigger and without thought it doesn't matter how fast you can see you won't be able to consistently hit what you are seeing anyway

I firmly believe that you should not try to shoot faster than your fundamentals allow. Once you are fundamentally sound than start fine tuning your vision and expanding your control zone.

Race car drivers have to get a permit when they are kids just like everyone else...

[mgardner]

Moving your eyes to their maximum in all directions will stretch the muscles and warm them up too. An old skeet coach used to have us do that exercise.

I find that after years of shooting that the gun will go off seemingly by itself when a sight picture is acquired. The only problem being that the guys who design the weekly steel matches know this and set arrays that need to be shot in order so that your ingrained instincts will bring you down 5 seconds at a pop. LOL

Sometimes you need self control and conscious thought and the ability to turn it on and off.

[JKF159]

Practice doesn't make perfect it makes permanent. For every rep you do wrong it will take something like 10 times as many to repair the damage of that wrong rep.

Before even thinking about going fast all your fundamental skills must be so ingrained at a sub conscious level that you are only calling on them to perform the action required. You cannot shoot with speed and your grip is not correct or your stance is not right.

This is a game of building blocks where each component builds on the other. People always tend to focus on shooting faster and seeing faster but fail to realize that is only a component of the skill. How about the ability to shoot from a stable platform aquire the sights go through the firing cycle ect at the speed it takes to shoot fast.

Unless you can make the fundamentals happen faster than you can pull the trigger and without thought it doesn't matter how fast you can see you won't be able to consistently hit what you are seeing anyway

I firmly believe that you should not try to shoot faster than your fundamentals allow. Once you are fundamentally sound than start fine tuning your vision and expanding your control zone.

Race car drivers have to get a permit when they are kids just like everyone else...

What Mat said.

Being a beginning competition shooter myself I am particularly interested in threads like this. I have a lot of experience at slow and accurate fire but that does not mean that I can merely go as fast as I can and I will get better. When I tried this I quickly lost my trigger pull and was jerking shots really low and left. To continue jerking the trigger for many shots would just ingrain poor trigger control into my shooting. I have since backed off and I'm learning to go at a speed that I can get hits and pushing that speed a little at a time. This has improved my times quite a bit. I think if a brand new shooter were given the advice to go fast from the get go he would never learn the proper fundamentals therefore he would never progress past a certain point. After all, you would not ever teach someone to shoot by saying here, align the sights and pull the trigger as fast as you can. I think the advice given to a new competition shooter should depend on where their skills are at to begin with. If they are an accomplished shot then start going faster. If they are brand new then go slow and accurate before speed is introduced. If they cannot hit the target slowly they certainly cant hit it fast. I know this does not pertain exactly to the original post but I agreed with Mat and just had to say so.

[motosapiens]

Being a beginning competition shooter myself I am particularly interested in threads like this. I have a lot of experience at slow and accurate fire but that does not mean that I can merely go as fast as I can and I will get better. When I tried this I quickly lost my trigger pull and was jerking shots really low and left. To continue jerking the trigger for many shots would just ingrain poor trigger control into my shooting. I have since backed off and I'm learning to go at a speed that I can get hits and pushing that speed a little at a time. This has improved my times quite a bit. I think if a brand new shooter were given the advice to go fast from the get go he would never learn the proper fundamentals therefore he would never progress past a certain point. After all, you would not ever teach someone to shoot by saying here, align the sights and pull the trigger as fast as you can. I think the advice given to a new competition shooter should depend on where their skills are at to begin with. If they are an accomplished shot then start going faster. If they are brand new then go slow and accurate before speed is introduced. If they cannot hit the target slowly they certainly cant hit it fast. I know this does not pertain exactly to the original post but I agreed with Mat and just had to say so.

I think it's important to be a little more systematic than just try to shoot stuff as fast as you can. Pro football players don't just go out and play football. They break down the skills needed to play their position and drill those skills in isolation, and then string together multiple skills before ever trying to do it in a simulated play. In shooting, it's probably a good idea for newer shooters to spend some time just working on trigger pull while looking at the sights, without any targets to distract you (white wall fundamentals). Single pulls, (in SA and DA if you shoot that type of gun), double pulls, and bill drills, all with the same intensity of grip you use while shooting.

So imho, ONE of the things you should tell a new shooter is 'align the sights, and pull the trigger as fast as you can without disturbing the sights'. For sure, at the same time, the new shooter needs to develop the skill to shoot tight groups, and hit what he is aiming at, but most people should probably be working on both.

[JKF159]

Being a beginning competition shooter myself I am particularly interested in threads like this. I have a lot of experience at slow and accurate fire but that does not mean that I can merely go as fast as I can and I will get better. When I tried this I quickly lost my trigger pull and was jerking shots really low and left. To continue jerking the trigger for many shots would just ingrain poor trigger control into my shooting. I have since backed off and I'm learning to go at a speed that I can get hits and pushing that speed a little at a time. This has improved my times quite a bit. I think if a brand new shooter were given the advice to go fast from the get go he would never learn the proper fundamentals therefore he would never progress past a certain point. After all, you would not ever teach someone to shoot by saying here, align the sights and pull the trigger as fast as you can. I think the advice given to a new competition shooter should depend on where their skills are at to begin with. If they are an accomplished shot then start going faster. If they are brand new then go slow and accurate before speed is introduced. If they cannot hit the target slowly they certainly cant hit it fast. I know this does not pertain exactly to the original post but I agreed with Mat and just had to say so.

I think it's important to be a little more systematic than just try to shoot stuff as fast as you can. Pro football players don't just go out and play football. They break down the skills needed to play their position and drill those skills in isolation, and then string together multiple skills before ever trying to do it in a simulated play. In shooting, it's probably a good idea for newer shooters to spend some time just working on trigger pull while looking at the sights, without any targets to distract you (white wall fundamentals). Single pulls, (in SA and DA if you shoot that type of gun), double pulls, and bill drills, all with the same intensity of grip you use while shooting.

So imho, ONE of the things you should tell a new shooter is 'align the sights, and pull the trigger as fast as you can without disturbing the sights'. For sure, at the same time, the new shooter needs to develop the skill to shoot tight groups, and hit what he is aiming at, but most people should probably be working on both.

Mr. Moto, I agree with you 100%. Breaking down any endeavor into the basic skills is how all things are taught and learned. You start with the most basic skills and master those before attempting more difficult skills that require the basic skills to accomplish.That is what I am currently trying to do for myself to improve the speed of my shooting. I am slow but getting faster or maybe I should say I'm getting less slow. Thanks for your response.

[danjordan78]

There is a great book called "Zen and the art of archery" that might help understand it better too. Revolutionized my shooting for sure!

[Nimitz]

Yes ... Learn to stand and shoot accuractly at speed first, THEN learn to move and shoot accuractly at speed

Stoeger teaches this and so does Seeklander ... I think there's a hint in there some where .....

[mr0ldie]

I'm a new shooter and have been lurking around this forum for awhile now. I have a couple questions if you don't mind.

First -- and this one may be slightly off topic, so I apologize -- when I started I was closing my left eye and keeping my focus always on my frost sight as I moved through stages. Not long ago I was reading from some folks who advocated always shooting with both eyes open except on the long shots. As I'm new and still developing habits, I'd just like to do what's best and I'm sure I can adjust to either.

Second, I'm pretty confident I should have my focus on the front sight. Does your focus ever leave that front sight except when you need to move more than a step or two? For instance, say you're transitioning to a target that's maybe 120 degrees from left to right -- does your focus shift to the targets and then as your sight moves to where you're looking, you bring your focus back to the front sight?

Thanks for all the help.

[Nimitz]

Most shooters shoot with both eyes open ... With a little practice it's easy.

As a new shooter you should probably just focus on the front sight until you break the shot, then transition to finding the next target, HOWEVER, the type of focus you use for a Specific target really varies with distance. This is something you'll develop as you progress. For a 25 yard target you Pretty much need a hard front sight focus to hit alphas. For a 5 yd open target you may only need to see the muzzle of the gun on the target to get 2 alphas. Everyone is different but a hard front sight focus is not always required ... It is target dependent and something you must learn for yourself.

Edited March 9, 2014 by Nimitz