2011 Andover Saxon

Had high hopes for this shoot, but ended up with a poor 1186 (York). Struggled to read a tricky left/right head wind and C3 cannot deliver arrows fast enough to minimise wind drift. The Monster would have eaten the wind for breakfast! I also shot with 110gn points to get a decent sigh-mark which didn't help, although all my sight-marks for the three distances where way down.

I had also identified that my draw length is too short, and had a longer cam but no time to fit it before the shoot, which would have helped.

On the plus side, the C3 is a sweet bow to shoot, just need learn the art of reading the conditions.

Mixed weekend of shooting

Last weekend I spent time at two clubs, with the hope that getting out from the comfort of my own range would help with competition preparation. It was a very useful exercise. On Saturday I shot at Swan Archers, and attempted a York (which I abandoned after 100 yards on 584 points).

Lesson number one, trust your bubble. I levelled up the bow with the slope, not looking at the bubble and promptly sent several arrows off to the left.

Lesson number two, bloody keep pulling! Some of ends were very poor, so pre-occupied getting to grips with the new surroundings I forgot to shoot properly. Other than that, the good ends were fantastic, but I must keep my focus and discipline.

Lesson number three, when the sight marks are wildly out check the nocking point. The serving had separated and slipped. Consequently at all distances my sight marks were junked. I must check the basics when things go wrong.

On Sunday I shot at Worthing Archery Club, and shot the new 50m FITA compound round, and put in a respectable 663. This was despite some sloppy (again!) ends and a 5 when a fletching came off.

At the moment my focus is poor. I have the ability and the technique, I don't have the mental game sorted at all. I really need to get this nailed. I am hoping that once the real comps start this will be the boost and motivation I need. I am not too worried yet, there is plenty of the year left.

Double Portsmouth, and finally my 'A' classification!

After two years of trying, and always getting two of the three scores needed, I have finally gained my 'A' indoor classification. I shot two back to back 581 Portsmouth rounds to night.

There were some really nice spells and some great shots, but still littered with sloppy and avoidable shots. However the lighter trigger is starting to make sense now, and I am able to relax more and allow the shot to go off with little concious effort.

I attempted to talk to myself in my head during the aiming phase, but this proved a little harder, and kept switching back to consciously trying to put the dot in the middle. But this is a hard skill to learn, and it will take time and practice to get the mental routine ingrained.

Arrow tuning and testing from the Monster

I headed down to the field today to get sight marks and attempt a paper tune from the Monster with my 420 PT's and some 380 PT's that I have (just fitted a new string). I originally got the 420's for the C3, but I am going back to the Monster as I suffer badly form sight marks (strange shape head). The arrows are configured thus:

420
27.5" shaft length (all cut from the front)
120 gn Tungsten points

380
27" shaft length (I believe these are all cut from the front, as they are second hand)
120 gn Tungsten points

All arrows have the same pins, nocks (solid green Bohning Blazer) and vanes (1.5" X-Vanes, hot pink of course!). The vanes are fletched the same distance from the end of the shafts.

The 420's according to the charts and AA are marginally weak. The 380's in this configuration are spot on. The bow is setup as:

60lbs
27.75" DL
24 strand string (452X)
28 strand cables
Monster 7 modules (this is an M6).

The paper tune showed up the same 1.5" left hand tear for both sets of arrows. Also slightly high (~5mm) but that is through choice. Moving the rest further out to the left did decrease the tear but both arrows continued to shoot with the same left hand tear consistently over and over again.

I then shot 30m and 50m with both sets of arrows and couldn't spot any difference. The good shots landed in the 10. The bad ones, well no arrow is going to save me! After that I shot just the 420's. Even at 90m, the good shots all landed in 10 size groups. The bad shots, again fizzed off.

So what does this tell me? Stop worrying about bloody spine and get one with shooting! As long as I don't start shooting Easton Jazz arrows or something stupid like that, then it does not really matter. The good shots from the M result in awesome groups. Its down to me to sort out the bad ones and build some consistency.

So there we go, some real world testing, hope that's useful.