[JThompson]

I say tension for lack of a better word... I've been pushing at my limits as far as speed goes lately and i wanted to run a few thoughts by you. I've been focusing on just "feeling" what it takes to be fast on the draw and transitions. My draw isn't bad, but my transitions needed a lot of work. I've made leaps on those and here's the two key points that I noticed while just "feeling" what my body was telling me.

The first is that I can not be to relaxed, esp in the belly area. If I let those muscles go completely noodle, it takes to long to fire them to move. What I found was even though my knees and waist were doing most of the turning, my abs fire before I can move my knees and waist. I don't know if it's the same for you or not, but just feeling what was happening on a snap transition, my abs fire and then my waist and knees move. I "think" this is something that most people do without really knowing about it. I also found that if I just slightly tense them in preparation my stance and index is more solid.

So now when I get up to the line I assume the stand and just pull the muscles a tad and take a semi deep breath at AYR and slowly let it out to the beep. I was getting excessive movement from the middle trying to keep all the tension out. I do not think this is the way to shoot. You need some tension in the body to resist the forces you are about to unleash. Now, when I go for that smokin transition, I only have to move the legs and waist because the middle has already been (primed if you will) also, I found on a hard movement the stomach muscles fire and that causes your body to take a big bump and upset your shooting. I guess you could look at it like this... you take up the slack before you pull something. Have you ever towed a car and had the person not take the slack out of a chain? You get whiplash if the slack isn't removed first. I see the slight tension in the middle, and basically everywhere else, as taking the slack out of the chain before you pull.

When I figured this out my transitions almost dropped in half and my first shot on the target improved substantially. When I shot Fluffy recently I had all the proof I needed. I was shooting .10s and trans of .17.21. Until I figured this out my best transitions were high 3s or low 4s.

Hope someone gets something from this...


JT

This post has been edited by JThompson: 04 May 2009 - 09:50 AM

[R.Elliott]

JThompson, on May 4 2009, 09:22 AM, said:

I say tension for lack of a better word... I've been pushing at my limits as far as speed goes lately and i wanted to run a few thoughts by you. I've been focusing on just "feeling" what it takes to be fast on the draw and transitions. My draw isn't bad, but my transitions needed a lot of work. I've made leaps on those and here's the two key points that I noticed while just "feeling" what my body was telling me.

The first is that I can not be to relaxed, esp in the belly area. If I let those muscles go completely noodle, it takes to long to fire them to move. What I found was even though my knees and waist were doing most of the turning, my abs fire before I can move my knees and waist. I don't know if it's the same for you or not, but just feeling what was happening on a snap transition, my abs fire and then my waist and knees move. I "think" this is something that most people do without really knowing about it. I also found that if I just slightly tense them in preparation my stance and index is more solid.

So now when I get up to the line I assume the stand and just pull the muscles a tad and take a semi deep breath at AYR and slowly let it out to the beep. I was getting excessive movement from the middle trying to keep all the tension out. I do not think this is the way to shoot. You need some tension in the body to resist the forces you are about to unleash. Now, when I go for that smokin transition, I only have to move the legs and waist because the middle has already been (primed if you will) also, I found on a hard movement the stomach muscles fire and that causes your body to take a big bump and upset your shooting. I guess you could look at it like this... you take up the slack before you pull something. Have you ever towed a car and had the person not take the slack out of a chain? You get whiplash if the slack isn't removed first. I see the slight tension in the middle, and basically everywhere else, as taking the slack out of the chain before you pull.

When I figured this out my transitions almost dropped in half and my first shot on the target improved substantially. When I shot Fluffy recently I had all the proof I needed. I was shooting .10s and trans of .17.21. Until I figured this out my best transitions were high 3s or low 4s.

Hope someone gets something from this...


JT

Some great observations there!
I had a Sensei once who gave me a great bit of advice; "breathe like a baby!" Most adults tend to breathe from the chest, which creates tension in the body. I guess they are unconsciously trying to look slimmer or something so they suck in the gut and force the chest to try and expand with the lungs...NOT what the system is designed to do. Breathing from the abdomen as we are meant to do lets you exhale correctly when executing sudden explosive movements, and lets the muscles stay primed for activity without being over-tensed. As well, beginning a slow exhale on "stand-by" helps ensure that the muscles of the trunk are flexing in the right direction when the timer goes off.
I tend to think of all skeletal muscles like springs. A spring reacts properly when it starts out slightly loaded, whereas if it is completely unloaded or compressed, it really can't do anything. An over-simplification, I know. But the mental picture works pretty well for me.

[JThompson]

Yes, that is the same line of thought I have on the matter.

Maybe everyone knows this already and I was a little slow on the uptake. I've always had a problem "accepting" without some sort of empirical data... "because." never worked for me as a child, nor as an adult.

This post has been edited by JThompson: 04 May 2009 - 10:12 AM

[R.Elliott]

JThompson, on May 4 2009, 09:11 AM, said:

I've always had a problem "accepting" without some sort of empirical data... "because." never worked for me as a child, nor as an adult.

Ditto. I just HAVE to experiment with things in order to truly understand how to do something both correctly and incoprrectly......no matter what anyone tells me is the "right" way. Step by step tutorials aren't really about learning anyway; they are about memorizing.