Affect of stress on your shooting

[pwilli17]

Good evening CGN!
I have a few questions that I wanted to ask you guys. I was having a discussion this evening about shooting under stress and the accuracy degradation that comes with it, and found that I did not have enough background on this topic. I understand that there is a loss of fine motor control but that was about I could reliably say, as I don't like speaking out of my ... I would like to learn as much as I can. I was hoping you could point me in the direction of some trustworthy resources about how stress affects your shooting. Maybe some articles that discuss this or websites with statistics. Thank you in advance!
Pwilli17

[18Dmedic]

That's all good and dandy but I don't care how someone else shoots under stress. I want to know how I shoot under stress...that's the better question to ask yourself.

The best way to answer it is to simulate stress to the best of your ability and see what happens.

Then, train your butt off to get better under stress.

You will always fall to the lowest level of your training. And remember this...

Practice does NOT make perfect. PERFECT practice makes PERFECT.

[voiceofreason]

I've been told before that you basically double the size of your groupings roughly

Depending on the day under the stress of competition, I shoot better sometimes

Focus on the skills that are most important to you, and that is what you'll be doing under stress because your car just mine will simply be along for the ride, while your reflexes will be doing the driving

[meaty-btz]

There are ways to simulate it so that you can see in practice the alterations.

Adrenaline changes the body's responses. One of the first changes is increased blood pressure and heart rate.

Unless you have an adrenaline injector on hand to use (really, don't do this, seriously a bad idea. Those adrenaline injectors are serious and the effects are as well) then you can do something like drink a full sized rockstar all at once. Your heart rate goes up and your blood pressure goes up. You get giddy and agitated.

This will affect muscle control and precision.

Next do a max weight upper body work out. Now before you cool down go right to the firing line and start shooting.

You'll be lucky to even hit the target. Holding steady is right out.

The first time you do this it will surprise you. Over time if you train you can actually overcome the limitations as you adapt.

I did this for a while years ago. The other one was "groggy" training which I found to be unneeded because zero dark thirty wakeups always give an shot of adrenaline and that takes away all grogginess.

Many years ago my wife and I started designing a pain suit that would allow application of strong shock to a specific small area of the body to simulate injury. The shock would be strong enough to prevent normal use of the affected region and the pain would induce the recipient's body to respond as though it were hurt, or at least close. The idea was to teach the wearer to understand pain and how to push through injury when lives are on the line. To allow them to understand their own psychological and biological limitations.

[Bill Carson]

http://www.forcescience.org/fsnews/103.html

[CGT80]

The best way to learn, is to do it yourself.

Have you ever done shooting competitions? It is a fun and easy way to improve your skill level and teach you to deal with some forms of stress. You could incorporate some of the ideas from above into your competition.

I did a 3 gun match yesterday. It is all shot against a timer (if you aren't familiar with competitions) and accuracy on cardboard targets is graded. We also have a lot of steel targets. The last stage I did required shooting rifle from 2 different positions while kneeling and then one while standing. Next part was to shoot two shotgun slugs at static steel plates, then proceed to the next box and hit the two static (50+ yard shots) plates with your pistol. Then proceed to last box and shoot all green steel plates and the red one last. They were setup to look kind of like a Christmas tree. The catch...........we had to sing jingle bells the whole time we were standing in front of the Christmas tree. I had a failure to extract (9mm ammo and barrel in a 40 cal pistol) so I had to drop my mag partially out of the gun, free the case, and reload all while trying to remember the one verse of the song I know and working against the clock. I was even messing up the words of the song as I got near the end. It was quite hard to think about singing, hitting targets, and safely running a course of fire at the same time.

Another stage had 4 Christmas boxes on a table behind the shooter. Tables in front of the shooter had a loaded pistol, loaded shotgun, and an unloaded rifle, as well as a small Christmas tree. Under the boxes were shotgun shells, a pistol mag, a rifle mag, and a Christmas ornament. Our squad mates mixed up the boxes. We had to choose a box and then use that item. Shotgun shells meant we had to grab them and top off our shotgun and engage 7 steel floppers. Pistol mag meant a mandatory reload and engage 7 steel floppers, the ornament had to be set on the tree and then we had to shoot a steel plate at 40 yards with the pistol, rifle mag was to load up and engage the 3 40 yard steel plates with three passes (9 hits).

When I first started pistol competitions, it was a real challenge to deal with the stress of working against a timer, remembering the course of fire directions, watching my 180, and dealing with an audience watching your every move. It was far different from shooting at a couple static targets from one shooting position.

I now do pretty well in competitions and have a lot of fun. It took practice at the range and dry firing at home, along with planning or figuring out how to best deal with certain shooting scenarios, and time, to get better. I have been at it for 5 years or so. I did a couple man on man matches as well. It is two shooters side by side with a race track Christmas tree and a button for each shooter. Both shooters have 7 targets each. When both shooters press their buttons, the tree starts lighting up. On green, you drop the button and pull your pistol and try to engage all your targets before your opponent. I was surprised at how much more adrenaline I had when there was a second shooter vs. just a running timer. I wanted to see how my opponent was doing, but I had to make myself focus on my targets. This was also shot at night under flood lights.

Some people don't like the stress of doing the competitions and have ended up just going to the range to plink. I like the challenge.

Brian Enos has written books about competitive shooting and how to see everything going on in a fraction of a second......basically to slow down time so you can observe all that is happening. He also talks about how to make your self sharp and how to get your eyes to focus on the next target before your body moves. I haven't read his book, but have read his posts on his forum. I'm sure he covers stress while shooting. His is/was a professional shooter.

The next step would be tactical or real life/defensive type training, but I don't have any suggestions for that.

[Supertac916]

That's all good and dandy but I don't care how someone else shoots under stress. I want to know how I shoot under stress...that's the better question to ask yourself.

The best way to answer it is to simulate stress to the best of your ability and see what happens.

Then, train your butt off to get better under stress.

You will always fall to the lowest level of your training. And remember this...

Practice does NOT make perfect. PERFECT practice makes PERFECT.

^^^This

We will never rise to the occasion, but fall back to the lowest level of our training.

I'd also recommend to take some classes with certified and well respected instructors. I usually like training with military or LE vets, who have been in life and death situations. It also throws in a little extra fun compared to shooting at a stationary target from a bench.

[Gun_Smoke]

Good evening CGN!
I have a few questions that I wanted to ask you guys. I was having a discussion this evening about shooting under stress and the accuracy degradation that comes with it, and found that I did not have enough background on this topic. I understand that there is a loss of fine motor control but that was about I could reliably say, as I don't like speaking out of my ... I would like to learn as much as I can. I was hoping you could point me in the direction of some trustworthy resources about how stress affects your shooting. Maybe some articles that discuss this or websites with statistics. Thank you in advance!
Pwilli17

Read the Books 'On Killing' and 'On Combat'

They talk about this topic in depth. One of the best things to take away is on the topic of fight or flight. He basically says people don't just rise to the occasion they will fall back on what they know. If you can slay paper all day at 25 yards with a perfect position that doesn't mean you will be anything more than a scared girl shooting rounds everywhere but your target when someone is 5 yards away running towards you with the intention to cause you harm.

[SVT-40]

Define "stress"...

Some here are using the "stress" of competition as a yard stick.

How about someone actually trying to kill you, and it happening ruthlessly without notice....

That is true stress.....

[G-Man WC]

Stress relief is the reason I shoot. It's my therapy and the takes me to my happy place. -g