Archery - whats the craic?

[lihp]

[mudcow007]

Yeah think so, just off the east lancs

[mudcow007]

Did the first lesson last night, was firing a 24lb bow on 31" arras

Turns out i have been "firing" wrong for ages, i always fired from the side of my mouth, instructor person said this is wrong wrong wrong an i should be releasing from under my chin - who knew?

Also this was the first time firing using sights, twas weird

[Tigerlea]

[Rogerborg]

[mudcow007]

Granted i have only ever done archery in centreparcs so guess their training might not be the best, but they always taught to shoot from the corner of your mouth....

I seemed to be ok with 24lb, towards the end my arm was getting shakey, it wasn't my drawing arm, but the arm holding the bow that was struggling?

shooting from close range my groupings were really good, when the target was moved back it all went to pot.

[Rogerborg]

[mudcow007]

cheers Borg, im gonna watch some youtube videos etc to see if i can pick on technique etc.

I enjoyed it. I think it was £65 each for 5 lessons so not exactly expensive an they provided the kit

[andym]

My first archery lesson I was told to draw the bow so that my thumb was on my jaw bone.... arm s..... actually it went something like this:

Stand with your feet shoulder width apart, stretch your arms out to the side in a T shape, bend your bow wrist slightly and bend the other arm at the elbow so that your arms are in a straight line (if that makes sense, I was being shown when I was being told). Whether you're shooting a target 2 feet or 200 feet in front of you you always draw the string to the same point every time (back of jaw line).... don't draw too far as you could end up doing the "happy dance" (where you draw past your ear without realising and releasing the arrow). For really close targets aim MUCH lower than you think as the arrow travels in an arc..... most important.... never piss off any of the other archers (this was at the place I used to go)

Your arm will get tired, but you will get more used to it quickly and you'll want to move up to a more powerful bow.... stick with what you're using, I've managed around 200 yards with a 24lb bow in the past (over compensated for targets around 100 yards away and it went straight over the top of them into the compound where the archery owners big fancy (new) land rover was sitting, there was also a container in there... I was using a new set of arrows that day and the one that I shot hit something metallic after sailing over the targets. I sold those arrows to a friend and never went near the place for about 6 months after that), even though I got a 36lb bow after a few hours I still get disco arm and my aim goes to shit