Stance

Stance, slightly open

Preparing to draw

Preparing to draw, front view

Preparing to draw, another person

Start to draw

Start to draw, another person

Full draw

Full draw, showing alignment

Full draw, another person

Full draw, front view

Follow through

Follow through

By Derek Nourse and Jaco Wessels

Let me state at the outset, shooting a traditional bow is a lot of fun. Once you have a bow and arrows, what is the best way to go about shooting this simple equipment? Nock an arrow, pull back the string and let go, while hoping that it does not miss the butt and disappear into long grass.

This could be the story for many of us when starting out, especially if you are alone. It was for me and I had to unlearn most of what I taught myself. Not an easy task by any means. Learning the correct way from the beginning is a much pleasanter journey. If you have been assailed by target panic, which can strike at any time for no reason at all, and usually does when one is experienced, then I sympathise with you. This can be a very frustrating time and can take an age to overcome. Wrap your bow around the nearest tree, hang in there, reprogramme your mind to rid itself of the warped programme and it will be possible to regain form. This takes a bit of work, in fact, it usually takes a lot of work! Again, I speak from experience.

This is a treatise on the subject, a way of going about learning to shoot a longbow or recurve. It is certainly not the only way, but if you follow the steps outlined below, you will learn to shoot proficiently. You may modify the process somewhat and if it works for you, fine, at least you have benefited, which is what this article is all about.

The progress you make depends on you, so do not compare yourself to someone else who might seem to be making faster progress. Above all, do not become impatient and take shortcuts.

Reading about Kyodo and how it is practised revealed that form is everything. This would seem to be self-evident, but how do you know if you have consistently good form? The answer is in where and how your arrow flies. The Kyodoka spends a great deal of time perfecting form, in fact, some take two years before being allowed to move from the makiwara or practise target shot from five paces, to the mato which is shot at 29 metres. I am not advocating this at all, but it does illustrate the point – take time to get your form correct and become consistent from shot to shot. You also need to establish how to draw the bow and where to anchor.

Before starting, it is important to note the following points:
• You must be able to draw your bow back easily to your mouth, even when bent over at the waist, and be able to hold at full draw for about ten seconds without excessive shaking.
• Your bow’s brace height should be correct, and not too low.
• Arrows will be matched to your draw weight (correctly spined).

There are a number of requirements for proper form:
• Stance and grip on the bow.
• Draw and anchoring.
• Aim, breath control, sight picture and release.
• Follow-through.

Remember, in shooting a traditional bow, a sequence of actions must be impressed on your subconscious mind so that everything happens without you actually thinking about it. A rhythm must be developed for this sequence. Thus in the beginning, draw the bow slowly so that the release can be at the same pace, i.e. all in rhythm, which will also allow time to give thought to these actions. It is essential to be able to stop briefly at anchor to align arrow, shoulders, head and body correctly before releasing. With repetition this will happen automatically. In any event, shooting at longer distances requires a slightly longer hesitation at anchor before release to achieve correct arrow trajectory to hit the spot.

Stance and grip
Stand with feet shoulder-width apart, or slightly wider, toes turned out slightly, knees slightly flexed, (not locked straight), in front of a mirror large enough for you to see how you are drawing your bow, slightly less than at 90 degrees – with your right foot a little over to the right to open up your chest a little.

With the bow gripped in your left hand (right eye dominant, so right-handed; left-handers do everything the other way around), hang the bow arm at your side as though you were holding a suitcase.

The handle should be pressing against the fleshy part at the base of your thumb, which is in line with the bones in your wrist and forearm.

The bowstring should be touching the inside of your arm, but do not squeeze the bow as if strangling it, but hold it loosely so as not to torque the bow, which will cause poor arrow flight. The knuckles of your hand should make about a 30-degree angle to the bow.

You can also get the idea by using an outside corner of a wall or edge of a doorframe as your bow, placing the “V” formed by index finger and thumb on the corner so that your knuckles are at the above-mentioned angle.Not holding the bow correctly can be the cause of poor arrow flight, so it might be necessary to adjust your grip slightly in order to correctly align bow, arms, arrow and shoulders.

The stance is the platform from which all else happens so it should be stable.

Draw and anchor
Raise the bow arm a little so that the right hand can grip the string, one finger above and two below the nock point (Mediterranean release), no arrow at this stage, with the string located in the first groove of each of the three fingers to get a grip. Raise the bow to shoulder height while simultaneously pulling the string back, so that when the bow arm is pointing at the target centre the draw is about three-quarters complete. Keep drawing until your index or middle finger touches the corner of your mouth. If you use the three fingers under the arrow, place the index finger in the corner of your mouth.

Try both methods and choose the one you prefer and stick with it. The back of the right hand and arm must be in a straight line in this process. Your right elbow should be in line with your shoulders and behind the right ear at full draw and in line with it. Tension must be in the back muscles of your shoulder. Your shoulder and not your bicep must do all the work in getting the arm back.

To achieve this the right elbow at the start of drawing should be lifted up to about shoulder height so as to be able to end up in the correct position. Let the string down and practise drawing the bow a number of times until you can establish the anchor. Remember, there must be no tension in the wrist of your drawing hand or the rest of your arm, only in the back muscles of your shoulder.

Doing this in front of a mirror will allow you to see exactly how you are doing. Repeat this exercise with an arrow nocked, still standing in front of the mirror. Do this a number of times until you are comfortable with the anchor point. Place the thumb on the little finger to get them both out of the way, and to ensure your hand just touches your cheek when anchoring with the thumb close to your jaw so that the index finger can touch the corner of your mouth.

The arrow should be almost in line with the right eye, not away from your face and outside the line of your eye. Your head will be looking at the target and tilted slightly forward. Should the arrow keep falling off the arrow shelf, it is likely that your wrist is cocked during the draw, which tends to turn the bowstring out from the bow. If your wrist is kept in line with the forearm, the string is turned the opposite way by opening up your fingers ever so slightly, which keeps the arrow where it should be. Ensure good alignment, which means pulling the bowstring in line with the bow and aligning your shoulders accordingly. Your bow arm should be pushing as much as your right hand back muscles are pulling. At full draw your bow arm must be steady, as if it were held in a vice, which is what Howard Hill insisted on. Do not slacken tension in your back muscles because you are at full draw, but maintain the tension in order to pull through the shot.

Derek Nourse and Jaco Wessels continue their instruct­ions on shooting form with a traditional bow.

Aim, breath control, sight picture and release

All these actions are part of a continuous sequence so they are all grouped together.

At the start of the draw cycle, your eye must be fixed on a point on the butt/target that you wish to hit. Breath control must also be practised, as outlined in “One arrow one Life”. Inhale, extending your belly to draw breath into the bottom of your lungs before starting your draw. This also helps lower your centre of gravity for greater stability. Exhale slowly as the draw begins. On reaching full draw the point of the arrow should be in your secondary vision, your primary vision still being on the point at which you are aiming. Hold your breath while you align arrow with aim point. The bow arm should be pushing as much as the back muscles are pulling to keep the string hand on your anchor point, i.e. equal and opposite action and reaction.

The point of the arrow will be below the aim point. Pull in your belly, release and exhale. Releasing is simply relaxing the fingers of the string hand and keeping the hand relaxed in the follow-through. Stiff fingers after release are a sign of tension in the hand. If tension was in the back muscles the string hand should stay against your face, or at least move slightly to the rear of your jaw, but not away to the side of your face. If the draw was made with the arm, your hand after release will end up out to the side, away from your face.

Follow-through

Follow-through is holding your position at full draw. Do not drop your bow arm to see where the arrow went, for you can do nothing about it anyway. Simply keep it as if in the vice until the arrow strikes the target.

Do not worry about whether or not the mark was hit for you are still establishing a shooting pattern. Shoot only two arrows at a time and watch what happens to them. Do they strike the butt slightly sideways? Did the arrow fishtail or porpoise, or did it fly perfectly so that only the nock and back-end of the feathers were visible? Shoot at this short distance while building memory of your shooting sequence. Remember, you are trying to build consistency into your shooting sequence. Eventually, as the shooting pattern registers, you will make adjustments necessary to hit your mark, for example, a two-inch diameter circle.

Keep shooting at this short distance until you have embedded your shooting sequence into your subconscious mind and both arrows are flying perfectly each time, while grouping closely. When you can place arrows in this circle regularly and have done this over 100 times, then only should you move back to ten paces and go through the entire shooting sequence again. Remember to get a shooting sequence and rhythm, letting breath control be a part of it.

Remember the actions: stance, fix hit point and concentrate on it, breath control, drawing, anchoring, release, complete exhale, follow-through. This must be your routine for every shot, no matter where you are, whom you are shooting with or how much banter is going on. It is easy to fall out of this routine when conditions are different, such as with a bunch of other archers. Look at TV shots of golfers’ actions when addressing the ball. They focus intently. If their actions are inconsistent, they will never achieve good scores. Should you find that you are having difficulty with some aspect of the procedure, go back to five paces or where everything was fine and work out the problem. Again, do not be in a hurry to shoot from a longer distance before you have mastered shooting from the shorter distance. Make each increase in shooting distance not more than five paces.

You should still only be using two arrows and analysing each shot. A good shot usually feels that way from the moment of release. Remember to regularly draw your bow in front of a mirror, which will enable you to see exactly what you are doing so that appropriate corrections can be made. Remember, there is much input with a traditional bow – keeping it at full draw without the right arm creeping forward, timing the release, and following through without dropping the bow arm or having the string hand fly away from the face. It takes time to imprint all these actions on the subconscious. When the entire shooting sequence becomes a non-conscious action, and you do not have to consciously think about any aspect of it, then you will have made real progress.

When confident after having successfully repeated the programme at ten paces, move back another five, or three if you are uncertain. Again, repeat the entire sequence. Do not continue shooting when fatigued, as you will very likely develop bad habits. It is far better to shoot only a few well-executed shots than a heap of poorly executed ones. By well-executed I mean doing all that you should be doing during the shot, or at least attempting to and not simply shooting without concentration. Be aware of a lapse in your concentration, which can easily occur, especially if you are not shooting alone. At the start of your programme it might be a good idea to do this alone so that there are no external distractions.

Advanced practise

After having successfully competed the programme at 20 paces, a little advanced practise is necessary, making shots at different distances. Shoot one arrow from five paces, then 20, followed by one at 10 and one at 15. Record your results. If you had a problem at a specific distance, shoot more arrows from this distance until competent before moving on to the next one. You can also shoot from any distance within your effective range without pacing out these distances. When competent, you can move back past 20, but again in small increments only. Something to remember when starting a practise session is to firstly warm up a little by loosening the shoulders and drawing the bow back halfway a few times. Shoot your first few arrows from ten paces or less before moving back.

Subsequently, it will be beneficial to shoot at 3D or 2D targets where no marked zones are visible and you have to pick a spot on the target to shoot. Since a traditional bow can be shot from so many positions, it is good to practise from various positions, such as kneeling, sitting on the ground with legs crossed, lying on your stomach and shooting through a gap in a bush, or even from a car tyre positioned about halfway to the target.

Ensure that you are as stable as possible in all of these positions and that your lower bow tip will clear the ground or any obstacles that are close by. Shooting like this will put you under pressure, which is good, since if you want to hunt ultimately, you had best be competent in any position as it gives you more options. Even if hunting is not for you, should you shoot in a tournament or fun competition, you will probably have to take shots where standing is not possible.

At the start of any practise session, shoot a few arrows from a short distance to get your concentration going and ensure that the arrows are flying true. If you have access to a large tract of land, roving shooting (taking shots at random objects such as a clump of grass or flower) is a good way of improving your shooting under conditions that are very different from those on a shooting range. You will, however, require a point such as judo, rubber blunt, hex blunt to stop your arrow in a short distance and not lose it. Shooting a bow and arrow is fun, so enjoy yourself!