Winning- How Important Is It To You?

[TDean]

Should I strap one of them winged-keel thingies to my arse to allow me to turn faster on field courses?

[bgary]

oh, there's a visual

[XRe]

I need to pick up the Bassham book. I'm totally into the mind game stuff

Please, no winged-keel-asses

I'll throw out another plug for my current fave - Performing Your Best by Tom Kubistant. It's out of print - you have to buy it used through Amazon, or something, though there always seems to be several copies available. I suspect, but don't know for sure, yet, that it's a great supplement/companion for the other popular, well read books. It's a shame it's out of print....

[Ron Ankeny]

I have arrived at the place Matt is talking about, winning internally. The external wins are coming less frequently. I am at a point where folks (on the local level) who couldn't even begin to run with me are now handing me my butt on a regular basis, and it's not because they are getting better. Frankly, losing to lesser frogs in my little pond really sucks. I am now working harder than ever (diet, exercise, daily dry fire, live fire almost daily) just to maintain status quo. I have never worked so hard for so little.

Being knocked off of one's pedestal does have some redeeming factors. I am now reminded of why I shoot. It's because I love the shooting sports. Even though I am struggling with my shooting, I know I still have a lot to offer. Overcoming adversity builds character. Yes, I still have moments when I bitch, moan and wallow in self pity. But I am learning to accept the cards life is dealing and to play the hand as well as possible. This sport isn't all about winning. But it still pisses me off to lose.

[Flexmoney]

To Brian's book and Bassham's book...I have added this (third) must read:

The Inner Game of Tennis (it ain't about tennis, it is about shooting...and all your suckers need to read it...soon).

[bgary]

x2 on "The Inner Game of Tennis"

Other good ones include:

Winning Ugly (also by Gallway)

The Mental Game (Loehr)

Mind Over Golf (Coop)

Awaken the Olympian Within (Naber)

Winning: the Psychology of Competition (Walker)

Bruce

[Ron Ankeny]

I read Bassham's book. Still, I wonder if there isn't a point in time when we must recognize what is real, or are we better off wandering about in a world of delusions? Obviously the answer depends on the individual's reality.

[Flexmoney]

Ron, that was about the only hole I found in the Bassham book. Steve talked with Lanny and asked about that...Lanny had a good answer. Maybe Steve will share.

For me, the Tennis book filled that hole completely.

[.40AET]

I was with another American boat trying to win the right to be the defender that summer

Sorry for another drift.

Damn dude! Your the man. After 5 years of sailing around the cans locally, I could only dream of getting a ride on one of the US boats in the race for the cup. I didn't have enough experience to make the cut for the Volvo Ocean race, I can only imagine how short I was for the America's Cup.

[kimel]

For whatever reason I have found I tend to shoot better and when the weather sucks.

This proved to me, once and for all, that my mental game is far weaker than my shooting game (we won't talk about my lard butt physical game).

Thanks for all the great references guys. Going to have to start doing some more reading.

Let's see...dry fire every night, read sports psych every night....wow, I might be so busy I will miss dinner now and then and that might help my physical game too! Talk about your win win situations.

Oh...and I someday hope to at least watch an AC race in person. ESPN et al do okay but I want to be on the water watching one. I used to race cats with a buddy (16 foot Hobie's). That was a total kick!

[Steve Anderson]

There will be a long interview with Lanny Bassham in Refinement and Repetition II...coming soon.

Suffice to say, if you believe, you achieve.

The problem is this: What if you don't (can't?) believe?

hmmmmm.

SA

[geezer-lock]

Take a look at this thread for more insight into "playing the game"

http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?act=idx

David C

[XRe]

The problem is this: What if you don't (can't?) believe?

hmmmmm.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The concise central issue to the whole discussion.....

"Trust is a must or your game is a bust" - Billy Welu

[kevin c]

I have shot this game (IPSC) for ten years and have never won a match, and have never been first in class in my favored division (Limited). Only once have I finished first in a division, and that was a club match in Production against beginning shooters, only done because all my other guns were down. I have seen the people I started with make Master long ago, and I have seen beginners I welcomed to the club just a couple years ago pass me by, to the point now where they are giving me advice, not the other way around.

If winning mattered to me, if doing better than my peers, or even keeping up with them was so important, humiliation would have driven me away long ago. I shoot because I love it, and because I want to get better, and shooting to improve is rewarding to me in and of itself. And while other commitments and a lack of talent have made it painfully slow, I do see that I am getting better, and that is gratifying.

THAT is what I believe in, that I will continue to improve. That is what matters to me. If I lose that, I'm gone.

[Catfish]

I've won matches where the only reason I won was because I stunk less than the other guys.

I've also not won matches where I shot brilliantly, right on the edge of what I am/was capable of doing at that time.

I take much more pride and personal satisfaction from the matches that I didn't win, but shot fabulously and frankly am more often than not embarrassed by the matches I stunk it up and still snuck by for the win.

Winning is indeed a fantastic feeling, but shooting great is better.

Derrick

[grandbagger]

at this stage of my skill level, im trying to improve. personally, i treat competition shooting as a hobby. im trying to learn every time i go to the range. i always ask for tips and basic techniques.

im just a weekend warrior......

[Sam]

Entrophy is a physical law of the universe. Whatever isn't improving is degrading. The worst any competitor can do is to secure a "win" and then attempt to make a stand on that rapidly fading point in time.

Winning should only serve as a general indicator that the course of learning is on a more-or-less proper track. By definition, "wins" are history. History is only important when it serves to aid in the understanding of the present. It's really only the individual who is present that can be a winner.

I want to win. (future)

I won. (past)

I am a winner! (now)

Only the third statement has any real value.

To be a winner, you cannot define yourself by what you want to become or by what you once were, (no matter how recently).

You are a winner, no matter where you place, if you love the game and play with a full heart.

All else is illusion.

[John Dunn]

Sam says that stuff now, but at the ITRC he'll be back to his old tricks of pressuring me!

[Sam]

If I do pressure you, I promise to keep the all pressure in the present tense.

[Ron Ankeny]

Sam:

For years I wore a t-shirt when I coached which read, "It is not the desire to win that wins, It is the desire to prepare to win."

I agree, the desire to win in itself is empty and shallow. However, if the desire to win (future tense) results in appropriate preparation for winning (refining technique, goal setting, appropriate practice, etc.) then I honestly believe the desire to win is indespensible. Indeed, some of the best performers in many types of endeavors got there because of their overwhelming desire, no make that "need" to win. I think it's a temperament/personality thing.

[Jake Di Vita]

I think what Ron said describes me to a T.

I am nothing special...I don't have innate talent, I don't have spare time to practice, but I won't accept anything less than the best.

[Flexmoney]

When competitors of similar desire and similar preparation meet...the winner will likely be the competitor that executed the fundamentals the best.

Heck, we could probably talk about this forever. The deal is, in our game, we are shooting against the course of fire. It doesn't make a bit of difference to me how well Robbie shoots a stage. How he shoots, good or bad, doesn't change my 100% potiential on a stage.

Even going head-to-head in a shoot-offs...the goal is to get all the plates down, quickly.

I hope to completely ignore the other shooter(s)...and just shoot the problem. That is when I am at my best.

(Now, sometimes a little bit of motivation helps me get my head into the game...where it should be. )

[robomanusa]

I tend to put winning in the back of my head and focus more on having fun and being safe.

My last match I was able to keep another shooter in the match by letting him use my revolver when his broke and he couldnt finish the match. He didnt want to use mine, but I talked him into it and he beat me with my own gun.....That is just fine with me. I felt I won by being able to let another continue on and shoot the match having fun as well instead of having to go home.

[j2fast]

I'll admit that I've always been a must win, second place is the first loser type. Back in the glory days (about 50 pounds ago) I was a better than average athlete in my little corner of the world. Didn't matter what it was I left it all on the court, track, table, field, whatever and the point was to come out on top. I did everything I could, trained harder and longer, read every book on the whatever sport so I could scratch out any edge I could get over the "other guy".

Anyway I feel like I've come full circle somewhat, I still look to win when I'm completing in something but this being my first year shooting in pistol matches I consciously approached this differently. Case in point, my second match every I DQ'd on the second stage by breaking the 180 mainly due to a lapse in concentration. In the "good old days" this would have sent me over the edge mentally and I would have left the event. This time I took it in stride and walked the rest of the stages with my squad helping tape targets and help steel. I am definitely a novice in this sport and want to learn as much as I can from the great people I have/will come across.

I came into this with a new attitude; BE's book, the great shooters I've met, and the great folks here have helped re-enforce my need to be humble. The flame still burns, it just doesn't dictate my actions like it did in the past and I've have nothing short of a great time every time I've shot in a match regardless of the results.

[bpgorbe]

This time I took it in stride and walked the rest of the stages with my squad helping tape targets and help steel.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I have a lot of respect for those who get DQ'd and stick around to help.

-- Brian