While the subject of fear may seem out of place in a discussion about hitting a moving target with a shotgun, it is very real and is one of the main things that keeps shooters from ever reaching and then pushing their potential.
Even though it is a stumbling block to most, it can be one of the most life-changing experiences that can be learned from playing this silly game of shooting a 30-cent bullet at a 40-cent bird trying to break it before it breaks when it hits the ground. Truth be known, in our 60,000 hours of coaching over the past 25 years we have been able to help thousands of people become better in other areas of their lives through the medium of sporting clays. Our experience has shown us that performance at high levels, regardless of the arena, is about first becoming a master of the material and then having experience in the game. These allow you to become relaxed in front of many people while performing, which allows you to become the you that you are every day. In turn, this allows the brain to produce the consistently high performances you seek.
In his book “Extreme Fear,” Jeff Wise does a great job explaining fear and what it does to the human physiology and psyche. In Chapter 8, he explains how being watched is unnerving to most people, making public speaking one of the greatest human fears.
He writes:
“Being watched triggers a powerful, primal emotional response, one that’s threaded deeply into our evolutionary and cultural history and we have a deep-seated discomfort at being looked at.
Direct gaze stimulates the amygdala much more strongly than an indirect gaze, and if the direct gaze of one set of eyes is arousing, being watched by many can be horrific. The dread of public speaking is all but universal, and a plurality of Americans cite it as their number one fear. Even seasoned actors feel gut-wrenching terror at the prospect of stepping out into the sea of eyes that awaits them onstage. It is not uncommon to hear of singers and actors who vomit before each performance. There is something about standing in the direct gaze of hundreds of thousands of people that jolts the human psyche.
For those of us who have not experienced the horrors of stage fright it is difficult to grasp the enormity of such a moment, but the terror is equivalent to that aroused by actual mortal danger.
Once the panic spiral begins, the arousal of the sympathetic nervous system leads inevitably to the shut down of higher cognitive functions. Sian Beilock, a psychologist at the University of Chicago, has studied the ways in which high-pressure situations affect the ability to perform cognitive operations. She found that people with more working memory – that is, the ability to manipulate more complex pieces of information in their conscious thought – actually did worse when asked to take a math test under a high-pressure situation. She theorizes that people with large working memories become accustomed to relying on complex mental techniques and that when their working memories shrink under the effects of pressure they’re no longer able to use their habitual methods, and thus are left helpless.”
(This is where getting in your own way comes in. Many ask us, “Can you just look at a person and tell if they can be a great shot?” Of course we can, if we look into their eyes and there is nothing there then they can be a great shot!”)
Jeff Wise continues:
“While the audience may never know when stage fright hits, the question remains in the mind: ‘Will it happen again?’ Some performers conclude that it will, and flee the stage for good. Singer Carly Simon gave up public performance for eight years due to her recurring experience of stage fright; pianist Vladimir Horowitz left the stage for fifteen years; Barbara Streisand for twenty-seven.”
So as you can see, it is a real thing with real consequences. But it is also something that can be overcome. As we said earlier, if you can learn how to overcome this through our game, it is a life-changing situation that makes all the money spent doing it worthwhile. This is one of the great benefits of playing sports because you get the opportunity to experience the adrenaline rush that the pressure of being in the situation brings on. And if you fail, you don’t lose the farm!
We should probably talk about what fear does to you when the thought enters your brain.
The instant fear enters your brain (for whatever reason) three things happen and you don’t realize it. First, the large trunk muscles freeze up; second, your hands speed up; and third, your eyes lose the ability to fixate. This is why a deep cleansing breath is the first thing you do when you are about to do something in a pressure situation. Then move slower than what is normal for you and focus on something!
It is here that the simplicity of your routine plays a huge role in your ability to perform in a pressure-filled situation in front of a large crowd of people. Your ability to use your routines has less to do with what they are and what is in them, and more to do with how many times you have used them both in practice and in tournaments. Through using them, you will eventually get to the point at which they happen without you having to think about what you are doing – and that is the goal. Then you will be able to perform without thinking.
We have each watched more than five million rounds fired in anger at clay targets in teaching situations and have conservatively spent over 55,000 hours each as professional coaches. And we can tell you without a doubt, based on our experience and research, that the one recurring thing that happens when fear enters the game is increased muzzle awareness. The muzzle awareness encountered in performance situations occurs not only during the shot but also in the routine – and even when you are getting ready to begin your routine! We see this as a result of shooters trying harder. And trying harder doesn’t work, because it involves the thinking part of the brain, which operates 200-300 milliseconds behind real time!
“Thinking while performing is a distraction” –Vicki Ash.
So let’s go through what happens when we see shooters begin to try harder to perform under pressure situations. You have seen the pair and know what you are about to do. Your chokes are correct and you have ammo to shoot the stand. Your name is called. You get into the stand and begin. As you load the gun and move to the ready position, you look at the bead. You then look at the breakpoint and then back at the bead. Then you look at the trap and back at the bead, you mount the gun in the breakpoint and check the beads. Then you move the gun back to the hold point and check the beads and then dismount the gun. You look at the focal point then back at the bead and then you look at the breakpoint and back at the bead. Then when you think you are ready, your eyes begin to move from the front bead back to pick up the target and you call “pull.”
As soon as you see the flash of the target you mount the gun quickly and look down the barrel for the target and find yourself on the target. That means you are behind. Then you begin chasing it down from behind and desperately try to get the lead right and take the shot without stopping the gun.
While you might think this is an exaggeration we assure you it is not. We see it every week when we travel to courses across this country. When we take looking at the bead completely out of the person’s routine, they immediately increase their score by as much as 8-12 birds. What we have learned by observation is that there is a varying degree of muzzle awareness based on the perceived importance of the shot at hand. It comes from the shooter’s fear of missing, which leads to “shooting not to miss.” This leads to thinking, which is a performance killer. Skill is what happens when you are NOT THINKING!
This muzzle awareness evolves in about six stages, from too much in a new shooter, which causes the gun to stop, to just enough in the more experienced shooters who, through training and practice, know what the shot will look like before they even load and close the gun.
There’s an area you might not associate with fear affecting your performance: targets that take an uncomfortable amount of lead, either because of their distance, speed or both. A shooter’s ability to give a target more lead than they are comfortable with will result in muzzle awareness as that shoulder angel says, “that’s too much lead, it can’t take that much!” You pull the trigger on what you think is correct and you know exactly what it looked like, but the target did not break and the miss was behind.
Let’s talk about that shoulder angel. Just how many times has she been right when she said “that’s too much lead, it can’t take that much?” Our experience tells us the answer is “Never!” The only thing that angel can say is “that’s too much lead” and you keep listening to her!
So, as you can see, there will be fear at the different levels you reach in this game. In the beginning, it is the fear of missing. You go through the sequence of missing in the first third of the event, and then the second third, then the last third. Then you put it together on one day and win one!
The same can be said for second day of a two-day event after being in contention on the first day and then losing it by getting careful on the second day. This happens a few times and you have a breakthrough on the second day and win a two-day shoot. Then you must face a three-day shoot. But three consecutive days is more easily achievable than your first win or winning a two-day shoot because winning the three-day shoot is a product of the first win and then the two day wins.
There are no shortcuts to being the best you can be. Way too often, shooters dream about going from winning their club championship to winning the U.S. Open. That might happen in Disney World or in a dream, but not in real life. To win in skeet or sporting clays, it takes being able to recognize what fear does to you and then understanding how to cope with it through developing routines that allow you to not think and just do. Then you must put that number on your back and get in the game armed with your routines and attitude. Then you must run the gauntlet of disappointments that, when handled in the right way, turn into lessons that you first conquer and then build your game on.
Oh, and by the way, remember you must do all this in front of many eyes. So you better work on that, too.
How does fear manifest itself in your game? Things like trying harder, getting careful, checking the lead, muzzle awareness in the set up, missing break points, rushing between stands and pairs, hoping and wanting to know how many more stands you have to shoot, getting angry at the results, moving your eyes when you call “pull,” lack of a real clear plan, to name a few. While these are by no means all of the ways fear gets into your game, it is what fear does to your physiology that does the greatest damage.
Your brain is accustomed to running your body when you are in comfortable surroundings and it is not stressed out. So when you go to the shoot and experience fear, what happens? Your heart rate goes up and your breathing gets a little shallow and labored and you get a little tense. Your brain says, “Who the heck is this? I’m not accustomed to running this person!”
When you finally conquer fear and can go to the tournament relaxed and become yourself when you compete, you will be able to enjoy the competition and then be able to turn each result – good and not-so-good – into a learning opportunity that can only make you better.
Each year we encourage our shooters at our advanced classes and on our Coaching Hour to do two things. They seem to work wonders for them:
At the end of the day…
It matters less
the difficulty of the targets,
it matters
more how you play them…
It matters less
who wins or loses,
it matters
more who you become!
