A mock competition with spectators and noise gets archers used to pressure

The summary today

Beneath such a widespread idea there is very little. The most direct account comes from a team of sport psychologists working with Taiwan's Olympic squad before Athens 2004: a mock competition with crowd noise, announcements in English, family and friends in the stands, a bus transfer from the warm-up field to the competition field, and wind. Most of the archers felt pressure, and they reported that the experience had taught them how to handle it at later competitions. That is their impression, gathered by the same authors who ran the programme, with no measure of anxiety or score and no comparison group. The simulation was also one part of a broader programme, with breathing work, mental imagery, sleep deprivation and outdoor activities, so the team's best Olympic result, a silver and a bronze in the team events, cannot be credited to any one of these parts. In 2025 three coaches of the Korean national team say that training in baseball stadiums to get used to crowd noise has worked, but that too is testimony, not measurement.

Also phrased as: "simulating competition in training"; "training with crowd noise"; "mock competition for anxiety"; "getting used to pressure"; "training under competition conditions"

Evidence

• 2008
  For Archers Published later

  Applied account of sport psychology work with the 6 archers of Taiwan's Olympic squad in the roughly 18 months before Athens 2004: the mock competition included crowd noise, announcements in English, family and friends as spectators, a bus transfer from the warm-up field to the competition field and a windy environment; most archers reported feeling pressure in the simulation, and the archers said the experience had taught them how to handle pressure at future competitions. No measures and no comparison group.

  Provision of sport psychology services to Taiwan archery team for the 2004 Athens Olympic Games · Tsung‐Min Hung, Tse‐Chuan Lin, Chia‐Ling Lee, Ling‐Chun Chen

• 2008
  Context Archers Published later

  A team without Olympic archery medals for decades achieved its best result at Athens 2004, silver in the men's team and bronze in the women's team, with fourth and sixth places in the women's individual and seventh in the men's, after about 18 months of work with a sport science team. The simulation was one part of the programme, along with breathing work, mental imagery, sleep deprivation and outdoor activities, and without a comparison the result cannot be credited to any of them.

  Provision of sport psychology services to Taiwan archery team for the 2004 Athens Olympic Games · Tsung‐Min Hung, Tse‐Chuan Lin, Chia‐Ling Lee, Ling‐Chun Chen

• 2025
  Context Archers Published later

  Three Korean national team coaches, three in-depth interviews of at least 90 minutes each: among the team's unconventional methods they mention patrolling border fences, walking around cemeteries, overnight hikes without sleep, bungee jumping and, more recently, training in baseball stadiums to get used to crowd noise, which in their account has proved effective. It is testimony, without measures.

  Understanding the purposeful journey of an Korean archery coach group's self-directed professional development: a qualitative exploration of coaching expertise enhancement · Heonjae Lee, Ooksang Cho

Status history

1. 2008 Reported The first account comes from work with the six archers of Taiwan's Olympic squad before Athens 2004: a mock competition with crowd noise, announcements in English, familiar spectators, a bus transfer and wind puts most of them under pressure, and the archers report that the experience helped them learn how to handle it. It points the way of the claim, but with no comparison group and no measures: a single applied account, limited evidence.
2. 2025 Reported Three coaches of the Korean national team, interviewed at length, list among the team's unconventional methods training in baseball stadiums to get archers used to crowd noise, and say that it has worked. It is testimony, with no measurement at all, and it leaves the status where it was.

Related

Related articles

• Head-to-head matches and qualification: how much more pressure, and what it costs the arrowsBefore head-to-head matches, national squad archers are more anxious than before qualification. What it costs the arrows, and why matches produce upsets.
• Do archers shoot worse in competition than in training? The body and the target, measuredIn competition the heart beats faster, yet measured accuracy does not drop: what studies comparing competition and training show, and where they stop.
• Mental skills training in archery: what the measurements on archers showWhat has been measured on archers' mental training: score, confidence, anxiety, programme length, mock competitions and each of the tools in turn.

Research lines

• 27 studiesHow much the body switches on in competition
• 52 studiesMental training: what has been tested on archers since 1979

Other claims in this domain

• CorroboratedAbout 150 points on a FITA round separate a club archer from a national-team archer13 studies · 492 archers measuredStatus since 2003
• CorroboratedAn archer's arousal rises with what is at stake, and keeps rising as the competition goes on3 studies · 23 archers measuredStatus since 2011
• CorroboratedArchers are more aroused in competition than in training5 studies · 50 archers measuredStatus since 2025
• CorroboratedAt 70 metres a top archer averages about nine points per arrow7 studies · 72 archers measuredStatus since 2012
• CorroboratedEven in competition at the highest level, most arrows are not tens4 studies · 3,212 archers measuredStatus since 2024

See all claims on competition and scoring