Find the Perfect Aim Training Time in 4 Minutes (Evidence Based)
For a long time I wondered about how long to train for aim training. Looking around everyone had different aim training time suggestions. Being someone familiar with reading academic studies I decided to find the answers for myself. Here I go over the best way to figure out how long to train your aim depending on your goals. We all just wanna get better. Find LighthawkFPS here: https://discord.gg/rTBV36j7Pv Before we talk about overall practice duration we should talk about how different tasks require different amounts of practice. In this study they took a total of 179 participants and split them into 4 groups. One group had 30 minutes of training, one 15 minutes of training, one 30 minutes of training with a 30 minute break in the middle, and one 30 minutes of training with 6 five minute breaks. The task they had them train on was distinguishing between 2 15 ms tones of different frequency. So which one was higher or lower. What they found was pretty interesting. The 30 minute training group, and the 30 minute training group with 6 five minutes breaks ended up making the same progress in learning. They got better. The 15 minute training group and the 30 minute training group with a 30 minute break in the middle remained the same. They didn’t get any better than the control group, who hadn’t trained at all. The study theorizes that these participants didn’t meet the threshold for learning. That’s important, because even though this task isn’t a motor task like aiming it does shed some light on how long we should be training. In another task, this one dealing with the memorization of facts. The researchers found that 15 trials resulted in no better performance than 20 or 30 trials. Effectively the time was wasted. The difference here is the complexity of the task. Many studies have shown that more complex tasks benefit more from blocked practice where you do the same thing over and over again, while simpler tasks benefit more from random practice where you mix up a bunch of different tasks or vary the task you are performing. One theory that seems to make sense is that what makes the complex task complex is subjective. What’s demanding for you won’t be demanding for someone who is already really good at that task. Complex tasks become simple with practice. So if we take all that information together we can make a framework for how we approach different tasks. New tasks that are hard for us will benefit more from longer practice periods and doing them over and over again. Tasks that we’ve had a lot of experience with will probably benefit from variations or mixing with other tasks. So remember, if something is hard and you feel like you need more time on it, take it. If something is easy, maybe it’s time to mix it up. But how long should I practice each day now that I know this? That is a good question and it depends on how long you can stay focused and motivated to put out high quality deliberate practice. Several studies, looking at practice durations from 1-8 hours per day have found that there is little use in practicing more than 4 hours per day, with diminishing returns starting after 2 hours per day. Olympic athletes often practice in the morning, rest or nap for lunch, and then practice again in the evening. And this study came to the conclusion that practice over subsequent days was more important than the practice duration. So if you wanted to max out your training, aiming for 4 hours a day would be the way to do it. For the most efficient use of time though, it may make more sense to just practice for a high quality 2 hours. It all depends on the level you want to get to. Experts musicians in this study practice anywhere from 19-30 hours per week. That’s 2 hours and 45 minutes a day to 4 hours and 20 minutes a day. A pretty intense schedule by most people’s definitions. Now when it comes to aiming, you’ll be making progress as long as you're doing enough per day to reach that learning threshold. Experts don’t start off practicing for that long, they build up over time. To summarize based on this information, and this is my personal interpretation: the best training regimen would be one that focuses on complex and simple tasks in different ways. With two 2 hour training sessions, at different parts of the day where you can give the training your full focus. Well, it’s time for me to get back to training, this has been TomahawkCole for LighthawkFPS if you’re not already part of the discord feel free to stop by and say hi! Like this video? Check out our LighthawkFPS™ Aim Training Discord where we focus teach new aiming skills every month. https://discord.gg/FvAqYgP2Pf Find us on Twitter! Follow LighthawkFPS @LighthawkFPS Follow Coach deLiGHT @FPSdeLiGHT Follow TomahawkCole @TomahawkCole
For a long time I wondered about how long to train for aim training. Looking around everyone had different aim training time suggestions. Being someone familiar with reading academic studies I decided to find the answers for myself. Here I go over the best way to figure out how long to train your aim depending on your goals. We all just wanna get better. Find LighthawkFPS here: https://discord.gg/rTBV36j7Pv Before we talk about overall practice duration we should talk about how different tasks require different amounts of practice. In this study they took a total of 179 participants and split them into 4 groups. One group had 30 minutes of training, one 15 minutes of training, one 30 minutes of training with a 30 minute break in the middle, and one 30 minutes of training with 6 five minute breaks. The task they had them train on was distinguishing between 2 15 ms tones of different frequency. So which one was higher or lower. What they found was pretty interesting. The 30 minute training group, and the 30 minute training group with 6 five minutes breaks ended up making the same progress in learning. They got better. The 15 minute training group and the 30 minute training group with a 30 minute break in the middle remained the same. They didn’t get any better than the control group, who hadn’t trained at all. The study theorizes that these participants didn’t meet the threshold for learning. That’s important, because even though this task isn’t a motor task like aiming it does shed some light on how long we should be training. In another task, this one dealing with the memorization of facts. The researchers found that 15 trials resulted in no better performance than 20 or 30 trials. Effectively the time was wasted. The difference here is the complexity of the task. Many studies have shown that more complex tasks benefit more from blocked practice where you do the same thing over and over again, while simpler tasks benefit more from random practice where you mix up a bunch of different tasks or vary the task you are performing. One theory that seems to make sense is that what makes the complex task complex is subjective. What’s demanding for you won’t be demanding for someone who is already really good at that task. Complex tasks become simple with practice. So if we take all that information together we can make a framework for how we approach different tasks. New tasks that are hard for us will benefit more from longer practice periods and doing them over and over again. Tasks that we’ve had a lot of experience with will probably benefit from variations or mixing with other tasks. So remember, if something is hard and you feel like you need more time on it, take it. If something is easy, maybe it’s time to mix it up. But how long should I practice each day now that I know this? That is a good question and it depends on how long you can stay focused and motivated to put out high quality deliberate practice. Several studies, looking at practice durations from 1-8 hours per day have found that there is little use in practicing more than 4 hours per day, with diminishing returns starting after 2 hours per day. Olympic athletes often practice in the morning, rest or nap for lunch, and then practice again in the evening. And this study came to the conclusion that practice over subsequent days was more important than the practice duration. So if you wanted to max out your training, aiming for 4 hours a day would be the way to do it. For the most efficient use of time though, it may make more sense to just practice for a high quality 2 hours. It all depends on the level you want to get to. Experts musicians in this study practice anywhere from 19-30 hours per week. That’s 2 hours and 45 minutes a day to 4 hours and 20 minutes a day. A pretty intense schedule by most people’s definitions. Now when it comes to aiming, you’ll be making progress as long as you're doing enough per day to reach that learning threshold. Experts don’t start off practicing for that long, they build up over time. To summarize based on this information, and this is my personal interpretation: the best training regimen would be one that focuses on complex and simple tasks in different ways. With two 2 hour training sessions, at different parts of the day where you can give the training your full focus. Well, it’s time for me to get back to training, this has been TomahawkCole for LighthawkFPS if you’re not already part of the discord feel free to stop by and say hi! Like this video? Check out our LighthawkFPS™ Aim Training Discord where we focus teach new aiming skills every month. https://discord.gg/FvAqYgP2Pf Find us on Twitter! Follow LighthawkFPS @LighthawkFPS Follow Coach deLiGHT @FPSdeLiGHT Follow TomahawkCole @TomahawkCole