TargetTalk

To experienced shooters,

I know that visualization also helps in increasing performance in any sport. But I get confused regarding the content that I have to visualize.

Q-1 Should I just imagine the movement of the gun from the beginning till the end? OR also include each and every small part that contributes to perfect shot Like starting from perfect grip, moving towards stable standing position(imagining and creating a sensation of locked knees, relaxed neck,chest,shoulder muscles,etc in mind) and then moving towards visualizing deep breathing and its soothing effect on my mind. Further, smoothing lifting the gun the way I want it and maintaining proper SA ,impeccable trigger control, and so on.

Q-2 What has the be the pace of visualizing like If I want a specific area to improve like Sight alignment or stability, CAN I HOLD ON TO THAT PARTICULAR IMAGE FOR SOME EXTRA TIME AND ALMOST CREATE A PHOTOGRAPH OF THAT PARTICULAR SITUATION AND look at that particulate image for 2-3 minutes?

Q-3 Which mental training pattern is more effective like 2-3 minutes of physical practice combined with 2-3 minutes of visualizing and so on. OR Doing them separately at different parts of the day?


Would be grateful to those who clear my doubts....regards
Amarinder

OK - firstly everyone is different so there is no magic method or routine that you need someone to let you in on. What you need to do is try things and see what works for you.

Some very famous shooters visualise entire 60 shot matches, in real time. Work through the entire process on each and every shot, including abandons when things were not 100%.

I'm not that disciplined, but do visualise entire finals, including the emotions as others are eliminated allowing me to better deal with the real life situation that you can only experience in competition. I sometimes visualise with an arm raised, doing everything as if I had the gun in my hand, eyes open focusing on a hair on my hand as if it was the front sight (will depend on your eyes whether this works for you), and move my trigger finger releasing the shot.

If there are specifics you want to work on, such as sight picture, yes - work on that, but don't speed everything else up, just don't do the other bits. What I mean is don't rush through a visualisation of stance and raise just to get to the sight picture - start the visualisation with the sight picture, then the shot release, then follow through, then stop the visualisation. The brain remembers the visualisation as if it was real - so don't visualise something not real or your sub conscious will not help you in a match. In the same vein, always visualise shot release and follow through when you do sight picture or you are training yourself to have trigger freeze.

Lastly, the best way to do it - as above there is no one size fits all - but something you will benefit from for sure is when training on the range alternate take a shot, visualise a shot and repeat this cycle for an 30 shots (or what works you). Then when that's embedded, add 'take a dry fire shot' into the sequence.

Hope this helps
McT

Visualisation is very hard to do and train, and impossible for everyone to do the same. So as McT says, everyone is different. And I would add that you can have more than one process that you visualise;

So you can visualise the emotional feelings of going into a finals and shooting and hearing the announcements, and seeing people sit down around you.

But you can also visualise the shot process. For me I find it works well enough to start once I've loaded a (mental) pellet - and note the following is pistol. I do exactly the same every time, so I go through the final gripping, breathing, raise, starting to lower, picking up the sight picture and then gently squeezing the trigger until the shot breaks, and all is steady through the follow through. I then visualise the screen picture on a sius monitor when you hit an inner ten. I stop then and repeat after a short pause.

To me that is what works best and breaking the activity into bite sized chunks is manageable for most people.

Remember it should be done in real time for visualising activities and in as much detail, sound and colour as possible (even smell if you're that good at the process).

Rob.

Good points in the preceding answers regarding everyone having their own system.

Content depends greatly on your current ability, and reason for the visualization. You can use visualization to enhance any one part of the firing sequence by only including that portion, or eventually include the entire shot sequence. Many start with a small part of the sequence in order to keep the drill easier. Once you learn to "pop in" to the mental visualization you can add other parts, or expand to the entire sequence. As others have said, you can visualize other things than the actual firing, such as getting into gear, hearing noises from the gallery or other shooters before and during the match, poor weather conditions, anything you find to be a distraction in reality. I k now of one shooter who became "deaf" in the few micro-seconds of firing the shot (careful not to extend this too far due to safety concerns like hearing the line judge).

Visualization can be used to change your "mental set" if you just can't get to the podium due to feelings of "worthiness" or issues with"beating friends", simply by visualizing yourself receiving the award. (As realistically as possible).

This has been about "internal" visualization, or as you see and feel things happening from within yourself. Some can get to another level, external visualization, in which they see everything happening as if it were a movie, and they are a spectator. A more difficult method, but has the benefit of getting you mentally completely out of the action, so things can become more un(sub)-conscious.

I'm certainly not an "expert", but there are lots of books out there regarding visualization. One nice thing is that visualization can be done away from the range, not using up valuable range time, and can take as little as a few seconds, perhaps while standing in line somewhere to fire one perfect shot. (And perfection is always what you want to visualize, becasue that's what you are trying to train your brain to go towards).

Too long, but hope this helps. Good luck.