Conscious Practice and The Art of the Rifleman

When I was shooting handgun silhouette (and was reasonably good) I practiced 3 to 4 times a week, with mental focus to practice smooth trigger control. Hitting the targets, even at 200 meters was a given after sufficient practice, learning to read wind and mirage., as well as having the ballistics and sight settings set.

However, in a match, with 39 targets down and one more to score a clean match and a chance for the win, that 2.5 ounce trigger seemed to weigh something like 40 to 50 pounds. That's when my focused practice and muscle memory had to kick in. I am proud to say that often, that 40 target fell to the XP100 in 7mmTCU.

This is such an excellent article and spot on from the perspective of the science of learning. I received my doctorate in neuroscience and studied the neural basis of motor learning using songbirds as a model (songbirds use trial and error motor learning to learn their father's song).

The prevailing model of motor learning that guided our research was that motor learning required three fundamental signals: (1) context, (2) an internal copy of the motor signal ("efference copy" in technical parlance), and (3) prediction error (was the outcome better or worse than predicted, or stated more simply - reward or punishment).

So, when an actor is learning a motor skill, they first make exploratory movements in a specific context., and if the action produces the desired outcome (hitting the right note of a song), there is a positive prediction error signal that reinforces that movement in that context, thereby binding context, action, and reward.

As the author states, learning in one context does not guarantee transferability to a different context - this is exactly because learning is context-dependent. This is also why watching videos of a tennis player does not make you a good tennis player, because the efference copy (i.e., the motor signal) is absent. Real-world practice is key. Repetition through practice crystallizes motor sequences by minimizing the prediction error (reducing the "worse than predicted" outcomes and increasing the "better than expected" outcomes). This is also why we spend thousands of dollars on expensive long-range equipment - the reward of hitting a target from a distance feels so damn good.

100% agree with the author's message. Practice, do it with intention, and do a lot of it.