Planning to Peak in Archery is a unique book. It’s new thinking by a highly experienced educator about how to teach athletes, particularly archers, to manage their ability to focus while executing their shooting performance. In any repetitive-action sport, like archery, golf, place kicking, darts, etc., athletes must perform a set of physical actions in an ordered sequence to effectively and efficiently repeat their effort, but far too many athletes neglect to control their thinking in a similar and ordered way.
As the title indicates, the athlete or coach will read how to plan for the many aspects of the archery mental game. This includes writing goals, setting training plans, and planning practice sessions, pre-game routines, and the important pre-start routine for the last 15 minutes before the start-whistle sounds.
You will also learn how to construct a meaningful and appropriate on-site tournament practice session and how to evaluate your performance following the tournament. Self-talk skills are also presented as well as when to use them.
Many archers encounter a shooting dysfunction called target panic and have great difficulty getting beyond it. A full chapter is devoted to establishing a set of mental and physical steps to help both those archers who use a mechanical release aid and those who grip their fingers on the bowstring to rebuild their proper shot execution skills.
An entire section of this book is devoted to helping archers develop a proper attitude. You’ll learn about the importance of the three Cs (commitment, composure, confidence), establishing the proper competitive mindset, and why pressure is a myth.
Most importantly, this book gives archers a method to avoid the thought-lottery and its many pitfalls by constructing and following a written focus map to guide their mental focus as they perform. In short, by following their mapped thought-plan, athletes can learn to synchronize their minds with their bodies as they execute each and every shot. This present process thinking focus-map is a simple concept that can be visually drawn out. Templates are provided to do just this.
Coaches can learn about and use this structure to teach the mental aspects of archery or any other repetitive action sport based on a list of form steps. Armed with your list of shooting-form steps you can begin formulating a plan to guide your conscious focus. Beyond that, sample focus maps are presented for athletes at different developmental levels, from beginner to elite.
Each map shows how to sequence mind-manage focus with body-feel focus along with where to guide your visual focus. You will learn how to map these performance aspects on paper so both athlete and coach are truly on the same page.
The book further develops the mapping technique by plotting breathing patterns as well as planning primary muscle group loading. These aspects of execution must be completed in a timely and coordinated manner if effective repetition is to occur.
This book concludes with a short review of the five most important concepts presented and an honest assessment of what the archer/athlete must do in order to get on a proper path to their peak.
