Paralympic shooting and archery review

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Adaptative Shooting Disciplines - Paralympic archery and shooting.

https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9032/12/4/463

I didn't read it but just got in a professional news feed, might be of interest to folks. You can download a pdf

It's a review of the field:


Adaptive shooting disciplines: a scoping review of the literature with bibliometric analysis
L Puce, C Biz, HI Ceylan, NL Bragazzi, M Formica, K Trabelsi, Ł Szarpak, C Trompetto…
Healthcare, 2024•mdpi.com

Para-archery and para-shooting, two very popular adaptive shooting disciplines that have earned their place as major official events in the Paralympic Games, share some similarities, as well as distinctive features in terms of rules, physiological requirements, and equipment used. The International Paralympic Committee has a clear responsibility to ensure that all sports within its jurisdiction, including adaptive shooting, can achieve excellence in their respective fields. To achieve this, the conduct of well-designed studies and rigorous research is essential. Although some research has been conducted in this area, a comprehensive and systematic evaluation is still needed. Therefore, the present study aims to provide a thorough review and synthesis of existing research on adaptive shooting disciplines, identify strengths and gaps, and suggest future directions. Arksey and O’Malley’s methodology is leveraged and enhanced with bibliometric and policy analyses to review literature on adaptive shooting. Databases like PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, Web of Science, OvidSP, and EMBASE were searched, focusing on studies in adaptive shooting disciplines and analysing these findings through a blend of thematic and statistical methods. Twenty-four studies totalling 483 para-athletes (299 para-shooters and 184 para-archers) are included in this scoping review, focusing on a range of aspects, including physiological responses (n = 9), research design and measurement methods for evidence-based classification (n = 6), biopsychosocial aspects (n = 3), development of new methods and technologies (n = 4), kinematic and biomechanical assessment (n = 1), and epidemiology of injuries (n = 1). Seven articles focused exclusively on para-archery, thirteen exclusively on para-shooting, and four on both para-archery and para-shooting. In conclusion, the available literature on adaptive shooting disciplines is still very limited, especially regarding para-archery compared to para-shooting. This highlights the need for further research in many key areas to ensure a better understanding of the different disciplines and to provide appropriate support for para-athletes. Future research in para-archery and para-shooting should focus on technological innovations, biomechanical studies, and psychological support to enhance athlete performance and accessibility. Addressing the imbalance between the two disciplines, along with injury prevention and global participation, can drive the sports towards greater inclusivity and equity for para-athletes worldwide.

Seems a noteworthy endeavor.

[Archer1440]

I’m at the Olympic and Paralympic archery team trials in Phoenix at the moment and my snap remark is that there is absolutely nothing off the shelf about the solutions used by Paralympic athletes in this particular sport. Every single athlete has a fully customized solution for what would be obvious reasons if you saw how each of these individuals competes. In addition, the IPC seems to create a constantly moving target as to the categorizations of the various subdisciplines for Paralympians.

I’m not saying that there isn’t some value in studying this sort of thing, but it does not lend itself well to a general analysis.

To a lesser degree, the same is true for individual regular archers. It’s exceedingly rare for academia to generate studies of this sort that generate material of practical use to competitors or coaches.

Just a slightly jaded perspective from 41 years in the sport including time as a Guinea pig for said academia as a national and world team member. 😆

[BillSWPA]

Glenn, thank you for posting this. As an industrial engineering graduate and the parent of a son with special needs, I am always interested in what works for people with disabilities.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

You're welcome. A friend of mine was a coach for special needs kids bowling. Said these were the nicest kids to work with and the most rewarding. He also coached the high school bowling team (an upscale school) and said those kids were total orifices, spoiled, whiney, etc.

[BillSWPA]

Finally had a chance to read the study.

First of all, I commend the authors for trying. There is value in trying ot come up with some general guidelines for athletes with special needs and their coaches. All of the athletes and many of the coaches find themselves in that position without originally planning to be there, but instead being motivated by various circumstances to get involved. At least getting people pointed in the right general direction helps.

Beyond that, there are so many different disabilities, degrees of disability, etc. that I agree with Archer1440 when he states that specific solutions are going to be driven much more by the characteristics of the individual athlete than by any general guidelines. I do not think anyone is fully capable of understanding the world of special needs without being immersed in that world. Again, I commend them for trying, but I think actually watching some of these events, watching some of the practices, personally interacting with some of the athletes, parents of minor athletes, and coaches would provide a very different perspective. Looking at the author information, perhaps some or all already do so?

As an example, trying to determine the effects of visual disability by having shooters with good vision shoot through filters ignores a critical factor: the shooters with visual disabilities have lived with that disability either from birth or from whatever accident, incident, or illness caused that disability. Their brain has already developed techniques to work around the disability that the typically-abled shooters will not be able to duplicate during the test.

I am glad the study examined the mental aspects of training and competing, since these must be more carefully managed than with typically-abled athletes. A coach's job is to push, but in the case of a special needs athlete, that pushing must be gentle, measured, and delivered with sensitivity to the reactions of the athlete. Small victories must be noticed and appreciated. Too much pushing or too much correction of one problem can lead the athlete to beleive they are inadequate and to give up.

When my son started special needs hockey, the president of the board for the team described a previous player who sat on the ice for two years in a lawn chair. Everyone else simply practiced and played around him. He was happy doing that for 2 years, until he decided to get up and start playing hockey. That individual, now an adult, still plays hockey today. Had he been pushed too much too soon, he would never have reached that point. As a highly self-motivated individual, I have made this mistake with my son a few times.

Most of what I posted in the "untrainable" thread is relevant here so I will re-post it below.

I am working with my son, who has Coffin-Siris syndrome. He does okay with a rifle on a bench rest, but is having a terrible time with a pistol. I have tried both a Browning Buck Mark with iron sights and a Glock 44 with a Nelson Precision slide and a Swampfox Liberty optic. At some point I may try a .22 with a better trigger plus optic to further isolate skills, so that one skill can be developed at a time. Then I can progress to iron sights or more difficult triggers.

For most new shooters, I can draw a picture of a sight picture, and they understand. For my son, I made cardboard cutouts of a front and rear sight to show him the alignment. I specifically show him how the front cutout matches the front sight, and the rear cutout matches the rear sight. Understanding the student’s visualization limits and working within them is critical.

He started playing special needs hockey this year. Last year he could not ice skate. Teaching him how to skate involved making sure he had really good, properly fitted skates, as well as taking him on the ice until he got it. He was really motivated, and that helped a great deal. Some of the lessons in teaching skating are similar to teaching shooting.

Special needs people tend to get very strong ideas about how things should be. For both activities, I have to strike a balance between teaching him the best way and working with what he is comfortable with. His technique might not be the best, but if certain specifics are not hindering him too much, keeping him within his comfort zone in one area helps him progress in another. He currently states with his feet wide apart, but he is progressing to faster speeds that way. Someday, if an employer is willing to spend the time, his strong ideas about how things should be will motivate him to make sure they are exactly how his employer wants them.

A SIRT pistol is a really good tool for isolating skills, and can sometimes be used to diagnose problems which are not readily apparent during live fire.

I have seen a some really good, creative, ambitious things come from motivated parents. Strong motivation is not only good for the athletes but for those seeking solutions for those athletes.