Post
by bodhijobs » Fri Nov 02, 2012 3:40 pm
A nice article (at least thats what I felt) by Jukka which I came across for all the guys competing for the 7th and beyond (I wish to join the club soon)...
"Actually I should begin my story even earlier. This happened when I was maybe 13 or 14. Our small shooting club consisted of mostly men over 50. At the time I was the only active shooter under 30. It was great.
Those guys, well most of them anyway, had so much to give to a youngster like me. There were especially these two veterans who didn’t force their knowledge to me, but with little hints and tips every now and then helped me to get my act together pretty quickly.
They are both dead now, Tauno and Antto, but I have such warm memories of both of them. It was Antto, left handed shooter who I have to thank for the fact that don’t get thrown off my game if I have to shoot ”face to face” with someone, who said something very wise.
”Don’t ever quit in the middle of a practice or competition. If you do it once, it becomes too easy to do it again and again.”
Then, when I was maybe 15 or 16, I read an interview of an experienced pistol shooter, an olympian even. He said: ”If after a few practice shots you don’t feel right, you should pack your pistol and go jogging or something.” And I believed him. Hey, he had shot in the Olympics!
A few years ago I realized how terribly wrong he was. I should have listened to Antto.
Let’s say it’s your last chance to score a spot at the Olympics. You’ve shot well in past competitions, but there were always a couple of guys that did better. In
practice you have shot very well, but sometimes you have interrupted the training if you didn’t feel good enough.
It’s competition time. You go to the range, set up your gear, do dry fires and then, you start shooting sighting shots. After just couple of shots you get that same feeling you’ve had occasionally in practice. ”It doesn’t feel too good.” What do you do?
It’s your last chance to get to the Olympics. Sure, you might get a wild card, but you can’t really depend on it. You just have to try to do your best. The thing is
though, you don’t have any tools to overcome that shaky feeling.
If you’d just stick with it in practice, if you’d decided to concentrate on dealing with your difficulties, you would know what to do in that crucial moment. But now, you’re lost. Goodbye Olympics.
So, you see how right Antto was. If you quit once, why not do it the second time, and the third, and fourth. After that the only chance for you to get to a podium
is when you feel absolutely right from the beginning to the end. How often does that happen?
The same goes for conditions and your gear. If your glasses brake or your pistol gives you hard time, you should just continue your practice. The same thing could happen in a competition. In fact, you should create these situations for you.
”Forget” your ear muffs home. Screw off some light bulbs and shoot in bad lighting. If you use color lenses, try shooting with the obviously wrong one on. Put too much clothes on so you’ll be sweating all the time or shoot on your underwear so that you’ll be cold. Anything can and will happen in a competition. Be
ready.
If you shoot 25 meter or 50 meter pistol, go to shoot when it’s raining. Go to the range when wind is throwing small cats and dogs around or when it’s extremely hot or cold. Go shoot in the dawn. Go shoot in the dusk. Go shoot at the time of day when you’re usually eating lunch or dinner. They don’t plan the schedules based on your eating habits, you know.
Get used to shoot well even when everything isn’t perfect, because it never is."
Regards
BD
Last edited by
bodhijobs on Fri Nov 02, 2012 7:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Shoot Safe and Shoot Smart...
