Sports Illustrated, August 2, 1976, pp. 31-35
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
Concentration
Lanny Bassham, Olympic gold-medalist in small-bore rifle competition, tells what concentration does for his marksmanship: "Our sport is controlled nonmovement. We are shooting from 50 metres - over half a football field - at a bull's eye three-quarters the size of a dime. If the angle of error at the point of the barrel is more than .005 of a millimeter (that is five one-thousandths), you drop into the next circle and lose a point. So we have to learn how to make everything stop. I stop my breathing. I stop my digestion by not eating for 12 hours before the competition. I train by running to keep my pulse around 60, so I have a full second between beats - I have gotten it lower, but found that the stroke-volume increased so much that each beat really jolted me. You do all of this and you have the technical control. But you have to have some years of experience in reading conditions: the wind, the mirage. Then you have the other 80% of the problems - the mind.
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2 comments:
Interesting that this quote has been used so much over the past 30 years. Lanny Bassham is my Father and he created a Mental Management System that he used to win his Gold medal in '76 - he has been teaching that system ever since. He's a Christian and if you are looking for motivation or inspiration his new book "Freedom Flight" is excellent! Thanks for posting this quote on your blog.
Thanks Heather! It is great to hear of the continuing foundations of your father's work through the years.
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