m an efficient performance program. Scientists are showing that one crucial aspect of peak performance (going into a state of intense concentration) I associated with profound changes in the brain. The University of Maryland’s Hatfield attached skilled marksmen with tiny electrodes that measure the brain’s electrical activity and monitored their minds as they shot at a target. He found that just before an expert shooter pulls the trigger, the left side of the brain erupts in a burst of so-called alpha waves, which are indicative of a relaxed trance like state. Similar results have been discovered in basketball players shooting a free throw or golfers as they putt. This shift in brain waves appears to reflect a dramatic change in athletes mental state at the moment of peak performance, says Hatfield. Neuroscientists have long known that each hemisphere of the human brain specializes in certain activities, with the left brain being more actively involved in language and analytical skills and the right brain being more adapt at spatial relations and pattern recognition. Hatfield’s research suggests that during peak performance, the mind relaxes its analytical side and allows its right side to control the body. The result is the trance like “flow” state that many athletes and other people report experiencing when they are intensely engaged in an activity. (Allam.F,1992pg.56)One world champion archer described focusing as “blocking out everything in my world, expect me and my target. The bow becomes an extension of me. All attention is focused on lining up my pin (sight) with the center of the target. At this point n time, that is all I see, hear, or feel. With the bow drawn and sight on target, a quick body scan can tell me if anything is off. If everything feels right, I hold focus and simply let the arrow fly. It will find the target. If something feels off I lower the bow and draw again.”Once a p...
