In The "zone"

[ap3]

On the orginal point of what to think about, I was speaking to a friend of mine that is a Doctor of Sports Psychology who also does mental coaching for collegiate rifle teams and his view was that what you are after is a state of self-hypnosis.

For some of us it is a mental thought or cue word that gets us in to a trance-like state, for others it is the process of clearing your mind and being thoughtless. Both are towards the same goal of accessing your subconsious while you shoot by being in a trance like state.

Through practicing perfection without scoring you learn muscle memory, through accessing your sub-conscious via a form of self-hynosis you remove all distraction to allow the most powerful part of your mind to maximize your muscle memory. Without a lot of practice you can't think your way to winning, without excerise you can't think your way to physically get to position to shoot, or without learning how to read a stage you can think your way to efficiency. If you have worked on the following three parts of your shooting and can master the art of being able to shoot in a trance like state, then you have the ptoential of maximum and consistent performance.

My friend states the members of rifle teams he coaches have a myraid of ways they seek for self-hynosis all oriented toward distracting their mind from the surroundings of the tournament.

He is also a strong believer in the power of positive self-talk. If you look over a stage and say "Crap, swingers I always struggle with them" well guess what is going to happen. You are better off to say. "Swingers, great I am getting better each time I shoot at them"

Anyway I have rambled. It is all just what the doctor ordered.