[senior smoke]

Hello:
In my opinion, the biggest mystery in all of sport is going into a slump. To my knowledge, no one really knows what causes a slump? Some shooters attempt to shoot themselves out of a slump, and some put away their gun for awhile in attempt for the slump to mysteriously go away as fast as it came.

As mysterious as a slump can be, I also find shooting abnormally high scores for a short duration very interesting too. Why do we suddenly shoot way above our average? Did we suddenly get better overnight? I don't think so. What's the cause?

I played a lot of baseball as a young man and one time I went 10 for 10 in hitting. My coach asked me if I was trying something different and I said the only thing I noticed was I could see the rotation on the ball very clearly and the ball looked as big as a grapefruit.

In the shooting sports when we are shooting very well the targets may look bigger than they actually are and you just can't wait to break the next target to come out of the house.

It is a mystery to almost all competitors, no mater the sport they compete in. If you ever found the answer, let's just say you could become a very rich man.

I have found if I am in a shooting slump I go back to basics and start all over. My slumps usually last a month give or take.

How many of you have experienced a real shooting slump, and how long did it last? What did you do to finally get out of the slump?
Steve Balistreri
Wauwatosa Wisconsin

 

[Chango2]

One theory I have: Eyes are not static in size and shape and function. They are organic and flexible. Maybe that's part of the equation, how well our eyes work from day to day. Also "luck"; consider the baseball player who can't "buy" a hit, but keeps hitting the ball hard. And then starts pressing...

I'm sure others can weigh in on this with much more technical knowledge and expertise...Dr.'s??? Please give your thoughts; interesting topic to be sure.

 

[senior smoke]

Chango2:
I have no idea why we go into a slump or why we suddenly shoot great scores? You may have possibly hit on something regarding the eyes?
Steve

 

[doggai]

Someone once said a clean house is the sign of a wasted life. That may be true of a house, but not a trapshooting effort. I think everytime we get up to the line its a matter of a clean mind. If the day starts off with a cluttered mental attitude with no cleaning out of the mental occlusions, a bad day can result. Think about the days when you were invincible in the tasks you performed, they were probably days when you let all of life's turds slide off your shoulders and you went about the task at hand with clear eyesight, no emotion and unclogged passions.

But, it's hard to be at that clean mental state every time. The trick is to be able to turn it on when it's needed. JMO.

 

[minnship8]

If you were a baseball player, I'll bet you remember times when the ball looked like a beachball coming at you and other times it looked like an aspirin tablet.

I played basketball, and sometimes the hoop looked 3 feet across and other times it looked 30 feet away.

It is what it is.

Regards,

Chip

 

[senior smoke]

JMO:
You may be on to something. A very wise man once said "why is it when I am at work all I think about is trapshooting, and when I am trapshooting all I think about is work"?

I think most of the all Americans either have no personal problems to worry about while shooting or they have found a way to just shut it off?
Steve

 

[jmunsell]

Buddy of mine thought biorhythms but we disproved that theory.

 

[Rubicon_Joey]

My theory...It's all mental. I've always heard and said "trapshooting is 95% mental and 5% physical"... If you think you are in a slump, you will shoot like you are in a slump. It starts with a missed bird due to other factors (mental lapse, bad shooting habit, distraction, equipment, etc..) and then once your mind begins to wander you find yourself in a slump.

Think less and shoot more....

 

[Rebel Sympathy]

I believe Rubicon Joey promulgates as good an answer as any.....

 

[wrd]

Think about each shot. Do not let anyone rush you. Focus. When you miss you will know what you did wrong. Try to never do it again. And good luck with that.

 

[senior smoke]

Joey:
Vic Reinder's always said that most trapshooters lost targets from the neck up.
Steve

 

[Straight50]

I don't know, but this is a great topic.

 

[senior smoke]

I believe that there are many different reasons for shooting slumps. Something I find interesting is when a person purchases a new gun. Most shooters will shoot very well at first with a new gun.

As soon as the magic wears off, the poor scores arrive andsome trapshooters will go back to shoot with their old gun, possibly causing a shooting slump. So when you think of it, could switching guns possibly be a cause for shooting slumps?
Steve

 

[GW22]

Professional athletes figured out long ago that there is only one absolute cure...

 

[WS-1]

Gary is right. The best round of golf in my life, we were all talking about quiff. The only time we stopped talking was when we were over the ball. In that brief, zoned-in second or two, we could see our perfect purpose without seeing anything else. It's like shooting at birds. If you think about quiff while it's coming back around to you, you won't be squirreling up your whole mainframe having this yin/yang conversation with your demons. You'll be trying to calculate the angles formed by 36, 24, & 36. You call for the bird, you shoot the bird, and you get to go back thinking about quiff. See, it's easy.

 

[Simon]

i think its in the eyes they work differently at certain times in a day. this along with weather conditions. this along with sugar levels whether you are diabetic or not can change if you cant see it clearly slump or should i say loss. the data processor gets it ultimate command from the eyes in trapshooting. try finding out what time of day you shoot the best. food timing is something to play with also. just my ideas thnks howard

 

[wayneo]

Some of you guys might remember....Ali's "Phantom Punch" that KO'ed Sonny Listen in their second fight. My Dad and I watched it, and couldn't believe the fight was over.

I think that film has been studied as much as the Zapruder film.

Wayne

 

[BIGDON]

It's mental and starts with the first miss. Your brain is cluttered with non-shooting garbage. Then the 2nd miss now you are getting upset because you might ruin a good thing. Then the pressure of not missing becomes greater than breaking the bird, then you end up with a 92 or 93.

Don't think about work before shooting.(hard to do with smart phones, calls, emails, texts).
Don't look at a new gun before shooting.
Don't argue with your wife or someone else before shooting.
Don't make it bigger than it is.
Imagine a silver lever on the side of your head, when mind cluttered, pull lever and flush away the clutter.

Shoot and have fun.

Don

 

[senior smoke]

Don:
I never really thought about not looking at a new gun before we shoot. When I think about your statement, it makes me think that while one is shooting are we actually looking for an excuse to justify the purchase of a new gun? It makes good sense. I wish I had the ability to turn off everything and just think about the task at hand.

I only had 1 100 straight in tournament shooting over the past 40+ years. The day it happened I could have not told you who was on my particular squad as I seemed to be really in a zone, and handled each target one at a time.

Other days while shooting I can hear who is on deck, their names etc, waiting to shoot behind me. I admire shooters who can run straights. I once told a very successful all American that he made running straights look so easy. He said he was exhausted after he runs a straight. No matter how good a shooter might be I think it's hard work to be successful in this or any other sport.

Thanks for the good tips.
Steve

 

[shot410ga]

When I purchased my first computer, one of the things one could program in was a Bio-rhythms program. I got the program out of PC magazine in the 1980's. Yes, we did program our own computers in those days. At any rate, I kept track of my scores and bio-rhythms for a couple of years. And I was surprised to see there was a relationship between the charts and my scores. As my bio-rhythms peaked my scores did likewise. Not all the time (weather, and wind played apart) but enough to see a correlation. Try it, you may be surprised.