At some point in your development as a clay shooter – your scores are going to plateau and you’ll be working hard on making the next step change. You might focus on your equipment, your bogey targets or your technique – but maybe you should be focusing on your brain. If footballers and golfers can work with Sports Psychologists – then it makes sense that shooters can too.
The ‘fix’ to get you over that next step might be as simple as improving your focus, adjusting your pre shot routine or changing the way that you think about your goals. The next step might be a big one, moving into different competitions or classification and so the ‘macro’ picture of what you want to change might start to influence the ‘micro’ picture of what you are doing each time you pull the trigger.
Fortunately – there is some good reading about the mental aspects of the game and it’s something we want to deveote some time to here at ShootClay – some of the mental aspects of shooting are covered in the books and DVD’s that we’ve been reviewing (Chris Batha – Breaking Clays or John Kings Clay Shooting from Scratch) – but there are some great dedicated resources for this important subject.
Clay Shooting Success is a great new site with a good pedigree (Phil Coley was the first person to complete a Sports Science degree with a major in Clay Shooting) – they sent us their new ‘Clay Shooting Success Shooting Psychology Handbook’ which you can download for free through their site.
It’s an introduction to some of the work they do at masterclasses held around the country – which the ShootClay team are really keen on attending.
We’re staying close to the work that Phil is doing – we think this is really useful stuff for Clay Shooters of all levels of ability.
