Monday 7th March 2011

Run Times

1.4km split 6:40

2.35km 11:09

I hadn't done a run since the 25th February so I was expecting a slower run, but was surprised at making it close to 11 minutes as I was expecting more along a 12 minute after the initial split time.

@ SOPA

Warm, sunny, windy.

15x 10 arrow ends @ 70m, 122cm, unscored.

Total 150.

Worked on just shooting volume today.  Played a little with alignment and hand position but with the blustery winds it was hard to determine if there was any consistent effects to be seen from it.  However, group wise, the 10 arrow groups were all keeping within a red-zone size area but to the right due to the wind push.

On the 123rd arrow of the day, the nock exploded (both side tabs of the nock snapped off somehow, probably from age/fatigue of being shot many times) and resulted in a partial dry-fire and whipping of the string into my arm, so I now have a pretty big welt and minor abrasion present.  Lucky for me the club hut was open and I used an ice-pack briefly to control the swelling before completing the rest of the arrows shot today.

Sunday 6th March 2011

@ Northern

Day 2, Northern FITA Star

Cool to start with to comfortable weather, some light winds from the front but nothing severe, some glare.

3x 6 arrow ends @ 90m warmup

FITA90

Total 162.

I shot on target 2 today, and the early part of the day had the target in mostly shade.  It made it slightly harder to spot since no shadows were being produced so I shot the entire day with the spotting scope.

I worked on my focus, with trying to maintain a good finger position, grip position on both hands, and as relaxed release as possible.  Due to this, my bow arm did suffer quite significantly, and some shots my bow shoulder crept up massively and I had to really haul through to shoot as I didn't believe I had the luxury to let down, rest, and try again.

My shooting today in regards to alignment and release felt a lot better, and I made no adjustments to my windage at all, with the shots off-center mostly just me and my actions directly (instead of say wind pushing me).

Score wise, I was pretty darn happy with it.

90m: 42 50 42 42 40 43 = 259

70m: 47 46 51 50 54 50 = 298

50m: 29 22 28 23 24 25 22 26 25 20 25 23 = 292

30m: 29 28 28 28 28 28 27 28 28 26 29 30 = 337

Total 1186 with 34 10's+ X including 13 X's.

This also means that my QRE 70m+50m score is a 590, a 10 point increase to my previous best shot at the Metro's.  These are just all small stead improvements in my shooting, so I hope that I'll continue to work on things and creep my scores up and up.

Saturday 5th March 2011

@ Northern Archers

Overcast mostly, rain squalls, gusty winds at times.

4x 6 arrow ends @ 90m, 122cm warmup

FITA90

Total 168

The weather conditions were pretty ordinary at best for the shoot, and was quite distracting in how it was changing.  There was a bit of wind that probably was a bit of headwind since sight settings were a bit off early on with my 90m settings low, so I had to wind it down 2 full turns to get back on track.  Unfortunately my shooting today was also pretty ordinary.

I struggled through 90m, had a reasonable 70m, was crusing to a great 50m until toe end where I had a total collapse, but recovered with a solid 30m result.  As usual, my 90m score was quite the letdown, but overall everything was a bit off.

90m: 33 37 39 37 42 41 = 229

70m: 45 49 48 50 49 42 = 283

50m: 26 25 27 23 20 27 25 21 25 24 19 15 = 277

30m: 27 28 28 30 26 25 28 29 27 28 28 27 = 331

Total 1120.

By comparison to the Metro's a few weekends back, I was 29 points down from Day 1, though in thought, besides the heat, Day 1 Metro was pretty good conditions.  Day 2 Metro's I shot a 1130 with some gusty wind conditions coming up that made things a little more interesting.

I also had an opportunity to chat with Jesse McDonald from the ACT, and he recommended tuning the centershot different to the 'standard Hoyt manual' position, so rather than the right hand edge of the arrow being lined to the left hand edge of the string when at brace height position, he recommended that it only be half a point out from dead center, so that from the dead center centreshot position, you wind until the right edge of the point is dead center.

He also recommended setting windage to dead center on a perfect still day, and learning to shoot off instead of windage adjustments.  In discussing training methodology, his philosophy was to have a varied, but singular-point-session approach.  In this approach, you focus upon only one thing each session, but vary the focus session-to-session, rather than a continuous focus upon one thing for multiple sessions in a row.

I quite like this and so will probably switch to this methodology

He also recommended tuning your bow every 3 weeks or so, probably once a month is acceptable really, checking your tiller position, checking centershot, checking your poundage etc, as depending on how your bow is, it may shift (such as string creep if it's a new string) or if vibrations are changing things minutely over time.  It's quite a solid idea really and it's not terribly time consuming, and just requires shooting some bareshafts with fletched too to ensure the tune still holds true.and rather mess around with the tuning of my bow setup right now, will see how it goes on my new setup once it happens.

I'll be shooting the second day of the weekend tomorrow, I doubt that I'm going to shoot terribly better in how I'm feeling and the weather, but it's all just practice.

Friday 4th March 2011

@ St Pauls

Bright, warm, a light breeze but not of much.

3x 6 arrow ends @ 90m, 122cm warmup

36 arrow round @ 90m, 122cm

36 arrow round @ 70m, 122cm

Total 90.

In preparation for the Northern FITA Star, I decided to have a light shooting day to not put myself under any major strain, but to ensure my sight settings were reasonable for the weekend shoot.

90m: 50 43 38 44 41 36 = 252

70m: 49 43 45 53 55 581 = 296

Both rounds were quite reasonable, happy with the result.

Thursday 3rd March 2011

@ SOPA

Sunny, medium winds, constant at times, pushing gusts at other times.

4x 6 arrow ends @ 90m, 122cm, warmup

36 arrow round @ 90m, 122cm scored

36 arrow round @ 70m, 122cm scored

Total 96

Previously my sight setting for 90m was at 90.2/9, so with my sight rack extension all the way in.  The size of the sight ring was a little bigger than I had liked, but today as I was confident that the speed and sight setting increase was constant from improved form, I could afford to bring the sight rack back out.  It took 4 ends to set the sight right, and now the extension is in the same position as all the other standard FITA90 distances, and resulted in a new sight setting of 96/5, with clearance still available.

I then put down a 90m round with the new setting: 49 43 38 26 35 41 = 232.  Numerically it wasn't very good, but it was I guess on par with average shooting in the slightly windy conditions.

I moved forward to 70m, but was already feeling tired for some reason, but proceeded with a single round: 41 45 49 44 45 50 = 284, so once again, shooting around on average, consistent.

Tuesday 1st March 2011

@ St Pauls
Very windy, overcast and bright/sunny at times, very random weather.

3x 6 arrow ends, 2 ends blank 5m, 1 end 18m, 122cm.

Total 18.

Due to the new semester and beginners joining the club etc, I didn't get to shoot today.

Sunday 27th February 2011

@ Camden Valley & District Archers, UWS Campbelltown.

Light drizzle, overcast, bright at times with some light glare.

4x 6 arrow ends @70m, 122cm warmup

70m/720 QRE

Lunch

4x 6 arrow ends @50m, 80cm 5-X ring face warmup

50m/720 QRE

Total 192.

The weather was actually really good for the purposes of shooting since there was pretty much no wind at all and the conditions were great.

I didn't feel particularly strong for some reason, could be any series of reasons but I have no idea where to pin it so it really doesn't matter.

My 70m rounds were pretty ordinary, I just couldn't expand through the clicker today, I felt okay in the draw and anchor, even in holding firmly on the target, but as time passed in expansion, I had problems getting through, leading to poor release action and spraying arrows.

70m 

Set 1: 43 50 42 52 48 43 = 278 (first and last arrows for Set 1 were both a 3 -_-; )

Set 2: 46 47 42 54 49 48 = 286

Total 564, with 3 X's and 7 10's+X's

After lunch, the 50m was set up as 5-X ring faces, with three on each target.  I took the right hand position which was lower than the target butt centerline.  The round was much better, unfortunately however due to it being a reduced ring face anything less than a five counts as a miss, and I had two misses.

50m

Set 1: 39 (miss) 44 49 55 51 52 = 290

Set 2: 40 (miss) 48 48 49 52 45 = 282

Total 572, with 2 X's and 11 10's+Xs

Score wise and shooting, the 50m round was better, I concentrated more on my breathing cycles and my elbow position and used them to help me get through around the clicker but it was still quite a struggle.  However, I have been able to get through with letting down and being more patient instead of forcing shots through like I normally would have in the past.  I didn't come within the 30second flag marker time wise, so I at least still completed each end well within time.

They aren't actually terrible scores overall, but I just had hoped to perhaps post something closer to a 585 than a score not even submittable (564).  But thats just the nature of training with up and downs.  Next up is the Northern FITA Star, a double FITA90, so lets see if my 70m+50m scores will be as good as the Metro's or not.