Automation

 Many new shooter lament that they are not able to shoot in competition as well as they shoot in practice, both accuracy and quickness. Top gunfighters generally are quicker in competition.  The answer lies in the mind.  The novice as yet to master the mental part of the game


From the Sport Illustrate article:

"As an individual practices a skill, whether it be hitting, throwing or learning to drive a car, the mental processes involved in executing the skill move from the higher-conscious areas of the brain in the frontal lobe back to more primitive areas that control automated processes, or skills that you can execute "without thinking." In sports, brain automation is hyperspecific to a practiced skill -- so specific that brain-imaging studies of people who train in a particular task show that activity in the frontal lobe is turned down only when they perform that exact task. When runners are put on bicycles or arm bikes (whose pedals are moved with the hands instead of the feet), their frontal lobe activity increases compared with when they are running, even though cycling wouldn't seem to require much conscious thought. To return to Abernethy's point, thinking about an action is the sign of a novice, or a key to transforming an expert back into an amateur."

"Chunking and automation travel together on the march toward expertise."

Any thought process on the line will turn an accomplished gunslinger into rookie.  That is why a slow accurate shooter can fluster me or a match against a faster shooter or even getting up 2-0 with the thought "all I got to do is hit!"

Any thought is bad.  To be successful one must practice to be mentally tough.

Practice Application: 

Many shooters never reach their full potential because they never move their draw from the conscious, frontal lobe, to their subconscious part of the brain that controls automated actions.  To be competitive your draw must be an automatic action, like breathing.  I call it finalizing your draw.  If you are always changing your draw, whether to get faster or to get more accurate, you will be thinking about the draw.  Any thinking is bad.

You need to decide on a final draw, then repeat it over and over again.  Shooting off the clock at 5 feet repeatedly helps to finalize the draw.  Dry fire the same draw over and over.  Many shooter will have a good dry fire draw because they have finalized it but when they are shooting, they do not use that draw, they revert back to the frontal lobe, thinking about it. 

Practice should be 50 rounds repeated in set of five fired off the clock at 5 feet. Maybe three times a week. What you are doing is finalizing your draw.  You are moving from the frontal lobe to the subconscious,   You are not concerned by speed but you will get quicker and quicker.  You, of course, are also chunking data for accuracy at the same time.  You are striving for a smooth, automatic draw that is repeatable.

Competition Application:

To be competitive you must shoot your finalized draw as an automatic action from the subconscious.  If you think about anything you are slow and you are inaccurate.  That is why for most shooters the "go to" shot does not work.  It is not the shot that is the problem, it is the  "going to" that is the problem.  If you are thinking, you will not be as good as when you are using your finalized draw from the subconscious.

You need a pre-shot routine that prepares you to go onto automatic.  You need to go through your physical routine and then your mental routine prior to set command. I then recommend a waggle.  A waggle is a meaningless movement that is your signal to yourself that you are ready to go.  Then no more thought.  You are a loaded spring that explodes automatically on the light.

Most of our best shots surprise us.  How did we do that?  It is because we have shot from the subconscious.  We are faster and more accurate then we know because we keep getting in the way.  Ever once in a while, we truly shut down the frontal lobe and just let all that training take over, assuming we have been training effectively and not chasing some meaningless number.