The ingredients of the quality mental preparation

You know, when I was a professional full‑time shooter, there was essentially one “ingredient” that mattered: competition experience. The belief was simple: as you progressed through increasingly difficult levels of competition, your mental toughness naturally evolved.

In the Soviet Union, this progression was built into the system: local town competitions, regional, republican, zonal (similar to Tri‑State), then the all‑Union championship where teams from all 15 Republics competed. On top of that, there were events between major organisations — army, police, trade unions, railways.

Within that structure, coaches assumed shooters didn’t need a psychologist. You learned to handle pressure by being exposed to it, repeatedly, until it became familiar.

But when I started working with amateurs — shooters who have families to support, who cannot train full‑time, yet still carry dreams and ambitions — I realised that this old principle no longer applies. For them, “work smart, not hard” becomes essential. They must learn in months what professionals develop over years.

Alongside building correct shot execution, amateurs need to learn how to focus on demand, reduce anxiety, manage elevated heart rate, think rationally, and maintain emotional stability. Mental training becomes more complex because part of it depends on the shooter, part on the coach, and part on the opportunities provided by the sport organisation.

So how do I see the mental preparation of an amateur shooter with a dream?

I often describe shooting as a triangle. The base is physical and technical preparation. Only once that foundation is stable (once the correct shot process is consistently executed) can we begin meaningful mental work.

From there, mental preparation consists of three essential ingredients:

1. Mental techniques: skills such as breathing control, visualisation, self‑talk, and other cognitive tools. This is where NLP becomes particularly useful.

2. Effective training plans: training must simulate competition situations. The goal is not to “shoot matches” in practice, but to create structured challenges that gradually teach shooters how to overcome pressure.

3. Competition experience: regular! Ideally, a minimum of 12 competitions per year (6 local, 6 international) for anyone aiming at international success. To handle the pressure of high‑level events, you must be exposed to that level. And if a national body does not take athletes to international competitions regularly, then (in my view) it is not truly committed to developing the discipline.

The reality is that only a few countries can afford to send large teams abroad, and I’m glad that my former team from Kazakhstan is among them.

PS. As usual, I edited my grammar with AI, but it's edited my style as well. Originally, I used stronger words ;-)