Chapter 12 - The Skills Factory

Every year we see skilled athletes that make performing well look easy. Some of them are as young as ten years of age. This usually
generates a lot of buzz and we often hear comments like, “He is going to go far, look how talented he is!” This happens all over the world, but
the reality is that talent has little to do with it. I recognize that there is something different about the five percent of the people that
accomplish 95 percent of the winning but it cannot be explained away so easily as calling it talent. People use the word as if to suggest that
the players that dominate are somehow gifted by God and that explains why they are so successful. They just have a talent for it. You either
have it or you don’t. End of discussion.
I have been guilty of using the word talent as a synonym for the word skilled. This is not an issue most of the time but it becomes
problematic when you confuse acquired skill with skills that one is born with. If you are 7’ 6” tall, coordinated and fast you have a natural
advantage in basketball over someone 5’ 2” tall. I’ll grant you that but great players are not created, they create themselves.
To be successful you must look at those who have made it to the top. For many inspiring competitors who compete at a young age,
making it to world level is a goal of theirs. Certainly all of the players who make it to the elite levels are skilled but the world is full of skilled
players that are not successful. What makes the difference?
I don’t think I have a natural ability for shooting. In fact, I am still searching for my special talent. But I have known athletes who seem to
have a passion for their sport. One such shooter is Soma Dutta from India.
I met Soma for the first time in 1982. Her family, eager to find an international shooting coach, accompanied her to my International
Shooting School in Sequin, Texas, to check me out. Soma stayed at the academy for one month while we evaluated each other. At the young
age of 14, this resident of Calcutta held every major national record in her country. Her records for women and juniors exceeded the best
results recorded by men as well.
Passionate is the only word I know to describe this incredible young athlete. Just as a great artist seems to loose track of time when
working on a masterpiece, Soma possessed a special passion for training. Most shooters tire of training after four to five hours. If I would
have allowed it, she would have spent ten. I would insist she take a day off, and then find her sneaking up to the range to shoot.
Soma returned to the school the next year for several months. She shot in the Olympics in 1984 at the age of sixteen, the youngest
shooter on the line. She was ranked second in Asia and among the top twenty in the world. She won a coveted quota slot in 1986, awarded
to fewer than forty shooters in the world, qualifying her to compete in the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul. The advantage the passionate
athlete possesses is difficult to measure. Obviously, all skilled competitors work hard. Though it is difficult to compare myself to Soma, I
believe we share one thing in common, a passion for the process. I cannot explain why I arrived at the range before my peers and was often
the last one to leave. Shooting was never something I HAD to do. If you wish to say that passion is a gift from God I will not disagree with
you. It appears that the number of people that have a real passion to practice is much less than the ones that are made to train.
The elite also seem to have an uncommon persistence that defies explanation. When the going gets tough the tough get going may be trite
but it is true. I believe that adversity creates a special form of motivation in people. I sincerely believe that if I had been an average baseball
player I would not have won an Olympic gold medal in shooting. I was so frustrated at being a poor player that I had a special motivation to
succeed. Perhaps this explains in part why I was so driven to train. One thing is certain; training produces skill.
Skill is developed in the Subconscious Mind. The amount of skill and the size of the Subconscious circle is determined by the quality of the
training, the quantity of the training and the efficiency of this training.
Quality is a function of both the value of the knowledge you are exposed to and the efficacy of the instructors that present it to you. Is the
information you are presented with the best available? Is it up to date? Is it well presented? Are you learning from books, CDs, videos or
personalized instruction? How skilled are the instructors or authors at presenting the information? These are the factors that affect the quality
of your training; the better the quality the better the training effect.
Quantity is the amount of time you actually spend in learning and growing. It is not always directly related to the amount of time spent at
the activity. It’s possible to be at a training session and do many things other than learn and grow. It is not always a function of how many
attempts you make. Half-hearted attempts are ineffective and dilute the training process.
Efficiency is directly related to how balanced a player becomes in training all three mental processes at the same time in the training
session. If a player is thinking things that maximize performance the Conscious Mind is built. If he is utilizing proper technique the
Subconscious Mind is enhanced. If he is picturing what he wants to have happen and carefully avoids negative imprints the Self-Image grows
as well. When all three of these things happen simultaneously the training is very efficient. If however, the player’s conscious thoughts are not
those that maximize a good performance or he beats himself up after a bad shot, the training becomes less efficient, even if proper technique
is used. If any of the mental processes are ignored or performed poorly the efficiency of the training session is negatively affected.

Guidelines

To better understand training, we will look at six guidelines to building Subconscious skills.
Training Guideline Number 1
Catch yourself doing something right.

All too often, I hear the comment, “What am I doing wrong? If I could only isolate my problem areas and find the cause of my failures, I
could be a success.” Nothing could be further from the truth. That’s like saying if you study all the wrong ways of doing a math problem, you
will learn how to do it right. What you really need to do is study one or two ways of doing something right instead of a hundred ways to do it
wrong? If you study failure, you will become an expert in how to fail. So, stop catching yourself doing things wrong and trying to find out
why you are failing. Focusing on success alone builds Self-Image. Here is an example. A golfer hits a good shot and says, “Well, I guess I just
got lucky that time.” When he hits a bad shot he says, “Why do I always do that?” His Self-Image shrinks every time he repeats this kind of
behavior. A better solution would be to say, “What do I need to do to make that shot good?” if it is miss-hit or “That’s a good shot. What did I