A reader writes:
My concern about the experiment involving pistol shooters and fencers is that the activity they were performing was one in which they had already developed appropriate muscle memory for the task. They were practiced in those activities and so were able to do them with relative ease, and thus calm. A better experiment would have been to have athletes and non-athletes do physical tasks that none of them were familiar with. Ask the pistol shooters to stand on one foot, or the fencers to shoot at targets. I have watched any number of newcomers to the Pilates method, many of them hard-core athletes with considerable skill in their respective sports, struggle mightily with learning the movements. Athletes, in fact, often experience more frustration than non-athletes at first because they expect it to be easy. No quiet minds there.
Nike disagrees.