Proprioception

Your highest shooting achievement
Commonwealth Games
Skill Level
Professional
Primary Discipline
High-power Rifle
SCATT Experience
Over 10 years
Joined
Jun 27, 2020
5 Posts
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What drills can I do with Scatt to improve my Proprioception when shooting?
 
Your highest shooting achievement
10m pistol French Championship qualifications
Skill Level
Amateur/Hobby Shooter
Primary Discipline
Air Pistol
SCATT Experience
3 years
Joined
May 13, 2020
222 Posts
149 Helpful Votes
3 Best Q&A Answers
Hi,
Which body part are you thinking of with proprioception? Are you a pistol or rifle shooter?
 
Your highest shooting achievement
10m pistol French Championship qualifications
Skill Level
Amateur/Hobby Shooter
Primary Discipline
Air Pistol
SCATT Experience
3 years
Joined
May 13, 2020
222 Posts
149 Helpful Votes
3 Best Q&A Answers
When working on proprioception my main goal is to concentrate on the feeling of my body, on being able to reproduce a move or taking a position again and again with increasing precision etc. Hence I need to focus on body control and forget everything else, including shot results and everything Scatt shows me.
To do this I simply turn my laptop away or lower the screen such as not to see it at all and not be tempted to watch it. I do dry-firing and take shot after shot. Every ten or twenty shots I take a rest and look at the Scatt recording, in which most of the time I can see how traces and scores fit with my perceptions - or not.
My sessions oriented to proprioception are usually the longest of all. In my understanding coordination automatisms only build up with considerable amount of repetitions over long periods of time, meaning months or years...
David
 
OP
Nightstorm
Your highest shooting achievement
Commonwealth Games
Skill Level
Professional
Primary Discipline
High-power Rifle
SCATT Experience
Over 10 years
Joined
Jun 27, 2020
5 Posts
1 Helpful Votes
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Hi,
Which body part are you thinking of with proprioception? Are you a pistol or rifle shooter?
I shoot full bore rifle. I need some advice on which body part or group of body parts working on would be of greatest benefit.
 
OP
Nightstorm
Your highest shooting achievement
Commonwealth Games
Skill Level
Professional
Primary Discipline
High-power Rifle
SCATT Experience
Over 10 years
Joined
Jun 27, 2020
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1 Helpful Votes
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I shoot full bore rifle. I need some advice on which body part or group of body parts working on would be of greatest benefit. Also what drills would be relevant using Scatt.
 
Your highest shooting achievement
10m pistol French Championship qualifications
Skill Level
Amateur/Hobby Shooter
Primary Discipline
Air Pistol
SCATT Experience
3 years
Joined
May 13, 2020
222 Posts
149 Helpful Votes
3 Best Q&A Answers
focus on body control and forget everything else, including shot results and everything Scatt shows me.
The upper is one of my drills as a pistol shooter, however many shooters in my club are in competition up to national levels, including myself, and rifle shooters also use similar training technics.

An example for rifle shooters is to take your position, all the way from the rifle laying on it's stand to final aiming, with both eyes closed. When opening your eyes at that moment you will easily see any disalignment: if your eye is not align with your sights, if your aiming is too low or high, etc. This means that you don't have the proprioception of your correct position. Although you feel being in the correct position, you are not. The consequence is that when shooting you are always compensating for the wrong position with contractions (and you don't feel doing this compensation), which in turn affects your shots.
Following this finding, you will train correcting your position, concentrating on the feeling of the body changes, in other words correction your proprioception of the correct position.

At that point an exercise can be to take your corrected position repeatedly, and every 5 times or so, do it with your eyes closed, to check how your correction is becoming effective.

Another very efficient exercise is to have an aid surprise you in the middle of taking position by calling "close your eyes". This will help you detect if you are really using your proprioception at every shot, not only with the voluntary closed eyes shot. Extremely efficient as you can't cheat with this one.

Yet another exercise at the range is to have an aid loading/cocking your rifle, although sometimes not loading ammunition, to surprise you. This also helps detect if you, even unconsciously, don't have the same position when dry-firing as when live-firing. That happens very often.

When you think your body proprioception is well corrected, thanks to the Scatt you can also attempt a dry-fire shot with closed eyes. Kind of the ultimate test.

This series of exercises or any similar you can think of is probably efficient whatever your gun, caliber, distance, shooting position etc. It is core basic training.
 
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OP
Nightstorm
Your highest shooting achievement
Commonwealth Games
Skill Level
Professional
Primary Discipline
High-power Rifle
SCATT Experience
Over 10 years
Joined
Jun 27, 2020
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This is my drill as a pistol shooter, however many shooters in my club are in competition up to national levels, including myself, and rifle shooters also use similar training technics.

An example for rifle shooters in standing position is to take your position, all the way from the rifle laying on it's stand to final aiming, with both eyes closed. When opening your eyes at that moment you will easily see any disalignment: if your eye is not align with your sights, if your aiming is too low or high, etc. This means that you don't have the proprioception of your correct position. When you feel being in the correct position, you are not. The consequence is that when shooting you will compensate for the wrong position with contractions (and you don't feel doing this compensation), which in turn will affect your shot.
Following this finding, you will train correcting your position, concentrating on the feeling of the body changes, in other words correction your proprioception of the correct position.

At that point an exercise can be to take your corrected position repeatedly and every 5 times do it with your eyes closed, to check how your correction is becoming effective.
When it is good enough, thanks to the Scatt you can also attempt a dry-fire shot with closed eyes. Kind of the ultimate test.
David thank you that’s a great perspective from which to approach the issue.
In your opinion is proprioception the same as inner position?
 
Your highest shooting achievement
10m pistol French Championship qualifications
Skill Level
Amateur/Hobby Shooter
Primary Discipline
Air Pistol
SCATT Experience
3 years
Joined
May 13, 2020
222 Posts
149 Helpful Votes
3 Best Q&A Answers
is proprioception the same as inner position?
Not sure what "inner position" means...
Proprioception is the sense of your body position and movement. It is an innate sense like vision, taste, etc.
When you close your eyes and touch your nose with your fingertip, it is proprioception that makes it possible. You "know" where your nose and hand are, even though you don't see them. If your fingertip is touching your nose and you attempt to move it to your upper lip, it is proprioception again. Not always easy, you may end up above or between your lips. If you do it fast you will most always succeed. However if you start from your nose, take 10 seconds to do a round movement with your finger, let's say as wide as your face, ending up at your upper lip, you are likely to go too far, which you can confirm turning the other way around. This shows how proprioception can be deceptive. From there on you can train improving your hand and arm proprioception such as to reach your goal whatever the movement complexity. People who loose sight have to go through a significant period of improving their proprioception.

Proprioception is innate and training it is easy, it just takes time. The shooting training I mentioned above is a very simple adaptation to a specific context.
However like for all other innate senses some people have it better or worse. Some naturally have a high level of stability and are able to correct tiny moves very fast, whereas others only feel their larger moves and more slowly. That's where you detect future champions, among other things.
 
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OP
Nightstorm
Your highest shooting achievement
Commonwealth Games
Skill Level
Professional
Primary Discipline
High-power Rifle
SCATT Experience
Over 10 years
Joined
Jun 27, 2020
5 Posts
1 Helpful Votes
0 Best Q&A Answers
David,
Thank you
 
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