Breathing is a topic that is discussed in great detail in the Bullseye community. A quick look at the US Army Marksmanship Training Guide indicates just how much emphasis is placed on breathing (section D).
In the practical shooting world breathing is not discussed in much detail. The most I’ve heard is people recommending that you just breathe.
Over the course of shooting matches I had noticed that my vision got blurry during long courses of fire and I had a hard time focusing on the front sight. I initially attributed this to eye fatigue, however was not able to replicate the situation during my training sessions.
Recently during a match I discovered that when I arrive at a shooting position, I tend to stop breathing while I am at the position engaging targets. In positions where I have to engage ~6 or more targets, my vision gets blurry since I am literally “passing out” from lack of oxygen.
I’m not really passing out, but apparently I am managing to starve my brain of enough oxygen in that short period that it is having an immediate and tangible effect on my vision.
The short answer is that I need to breathe.
The long answer, which I have yet to figure out is how to time my breathing at a purely subconscious level to gross events in the shooting continuum.
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