Time to step it up a notch...

Hot off the back of the Welsh and & UK Championships, I had an email with a bit of fantastic news which could spell the biggest change in my Archery career since I left recurve behind and picked up a compound… I’ve made it into the European Pro Series!

I’ve wanted to go professional and join the Pro Series for a while, but I couldn’t make it to the qualifier for this years events as it was a 5 day shoot in Hungary that clashed with family plans and I couldn’t really afford it. I contacted the organizers though to register my interest and gave a brief history of my shooting and they awarded me a place in the reserves.

Well my number has come up! The next event is in Fort Van Lier in Belgium on the 23/24^th of August and due to last minute dropouts, the reserves have moved up into the target list and I have been invited – so I will be making my Professional Archery debut next month in Belgium!

I’ve had to get my passport renewed and one of my friends is competing at this event and has room in his car to haul me along and offered me a ride. We are splitting the ferry/fuel costs to make it manageable and I will be camping at the fort to save money as it is over 300 Euros to stay at a hotel for the duration of the shoot. I enjoy camping anyway so that is no problem at all for me!

Everything is in order, my bow is well tuned and I have all the equipment I am going to need. I’ve only got one shoot between now and then - a FITA field shoot at Fort Purbrook in Portsmouth in 2 weeks time so I will use that as a final chance to make sure everything is where it is supposed to be. We will be arriving in Belgium a full day before the competition though so I will have the full day to make use of the official practice session and ensure everything is on the money before the real deal.

Well..  in the immortal words of Q from Star Trek  - “The hall is rented, the orchestra engaged. It’s now time to see if you can dance…”

 

 

The UK & Ireland Field Archery Championships 2014

The UK & Ireland Field Archery Championships were hosted by my home club, Pentref Bowmen this year at our course in Llwynypia overlooking the Rhondda Valleys.

I was involved with the work party in the weeks leading up to the competition, cutting back the severe overgrowth to lay on 2 x 28 target courses and it took a lot of work but we got the field ready in time and got all the targets out and into place.

There was an excellent turnout for this shoot and the competition was going to be tight. I was shooting the Hunter course on the first day, and despite a poor forecast the weather was pretty good to us. It was mostly clear and quite warm, with only the odd passing shower in the afternoon.  I shot well for the most part but dropped a few 17’s during the afternoon on the longer/steeper targets so finished up on 532 points, placing me in 4^th place by 3 points.

Taking shelter in a shower! Yes its a handbag umbrella
but when you need it and you 'aint got it, you sing a different tune!

 

On day 2 we were on the Field course and the groups were sorted by score, so I was in the top group with the archers I was directly competing with. I didn’t have enough points to make 1^st or 2^nd but I was pushing for 3rd place and going into the last few targets I closed the gap and pulled one point ahead on the penultimate target.

Our last target however was right in front of the clubhouse – a 50 yard shot with everyone that had already finished watching adding to the pressure!  We got our arrows away and I lost the advantage, finishing on exactly the same score. It was down to X’s and my opponent had more than me on day 1 so he took the honour and I missed the podium by the narrowest of margins.

Even so I was still very pleased, I had 2 great days of field archery and put in 2 solid GBM scores close to my personal bests so I couldn’t ask for more and the medals went to those who earned them. I didn’t come away empty handed however, as I was part of the team competing for the Home Nations trophy and we won!

 

The winning Welsh team!
 

Last year we won the trophy in Scotland and it was the first Welsh win in 21 years, and we successfully defended it for 2014 so we kept the trophy and each team member received one of the limited edition gold WFAA UKIFAC 2014 medals. All told, not a bad weekend!

The WFAA Welsh & Open Championships

This weekend, Red Kite Archers hosted the WFAA Welsh & Open Championships at their course in Broad Oaks, Carmarthenshire. It was a 2 day shoot, with a Field and a Hunter round on their course which has recently been reclassified as a 4.5/5 on the difficulty scale – the hardest course the WFAA have run to date so we were in for a treat!

The weather was pretty good, a little cloudy but warm and very strangely – no wind! Anybody familiar with Red Kite will tell you how fierce the wind is on that course, it is usually blowing a gale on the top end of the course but there wasn’t a breath of wind all day. We did have one torrential shower that really came down hard but it lasted all of 10 minutes and it was sunny after that for the rest of the round.



The shooting was tight! We must have killed at least a dozen nocks/pins between us!

 

I shot really well and put in almost identical scores for both halves, finishing on 534/560 which is only 2 points off my personal best and put me ahead in 1^st place. With day 1 behind us, it was time to relax and a few of us from the WFAA camped overnight at the course. Pitching took seconds with my trusty little popup tent and I spent the evening enjoying a few ales in the evening sun. Bliss!

 

We rose bright and early on day 2, packed away the camping gear and got everything ready for the Hunter round . I put in another solid round with consistent shooting, there were 1 or 2 poor targets in the first half but I settled down and made a good recovery in the second half only dropping 10 points and closed out the round on 533 points.

The results went in while we packed everything away and then we were called to the awards. The results were announced, and I had won! I am now the WFAA Welsh & Open AMFU Champion!

A good day for team Wales Archery!

 

I was absolutely thrilled with this result and I would probably rate these as the strongest rounds I have shot to date. My personal bests for Field and Hunter rounds are 538/536 respectively and I shot 534/533 this weekend. My pb’s were shot on a literally flat course with no slopes or angles in great weather, and these scores were shot on a very challenging course.

I have been training recently and working hard on improving my form, anchor and release to get them more consistent and it seems to be paying off. The big one - the UK & Ireland Field Archery Championships are in 2 weeks time at my home club, Pentref Bowmen and I am really looking forward to it now after this result Bring it on!

Welsh Field Masters Tour - Round 2

Round 2 of the Welsh Field Masters Tour this year was hosted by Red Kite Field Archers at their course in Broak Oaks, Carmarthenshire which has a reputation for being a difficult course and it didn’t fail to live up to expectations!

It was a really nice day, sunny and warm with clear skies but as always on that course, there was a harsh wind on the top half of the course where all the long shots are. It is due to the landscape channeling the wind. On the lower half of course near the clubhouse it is dead calm, not a breath of wind but up on the ridge it is very windy and hard to hold on target, quite often blowing you off the target entirely.

I had a bit of a slow start as I couldn’t seem to settle but I soon leveled out and I was putting in mostly 19’s and 18’s. The first half was a little bit low because of this but the second half picked up with some better shots. Everything was going ok until the penultimate target…

Target 14 is a 2 peg walkup, 2 arrows at 23 yards and 2 at 20 on a fairly steep uphill angle. On the first half I scored 19 points with only one out of the spot. On the second time around, I put in a 4 4 4 miss, shooting my final arrow at the wrong target face! Only scoring 12 for that target dropped my half considerably. The final target was the 15/14 yard walkup which I scored all X’s on so recovered well but too late – damage done.

I finished on a 513 in joint second place which was still a decent result. If I hadn’t messed up that target it would have been close to 520 which is about my average for that course but I wasn’t very happy with my shooting. It felt inconsistent so I need to do some work on shot execution and I am still not 100% with my marks at long range. 

What I need is access to a long flat field to get accurate long distance marks, and some targets on slopes where I can test them. The problem is our club only has 50 yards flat and we cannot leave practice targets out due to vandalism so setting up for practice on the slopes is difficult. I am going to find a way to sort it out in the coming weeks, probably at a Target club that has open space to check my long marks ready for the next shoot.

The next one is a classification round at March Hare, over the English border in Throckmorton in 4 weeks time. Bit of a drive (2.5hrs) but it is an almost flat course so it is a good place to test gear out without having to worry about slopes and angles etc. It is also 2 weeks before the Welsh Open so a final chance to practice.

New Darts!

I’ve been really lazy and haven’t updated my blog for a long time, so I think an update is long overdue!

Well the indoor season has come to a close and the Field season is upon us again (at last!). I have been tempted for some time to change my arrows and after my last indoor target shoot, I had a 3 week gap before my first Field shoot so used the time to set up some new arrows ready for the 2014 field season.

After lots of research it came down to a choice between Easton X10-ProTour’s or Carbon Express Nano-XR’s. The Nano’s seemed to be the favorite they are highly spoken of by several professionals that I know and trust. One of my friends has a set in pretty much the spec I would need and let me try them. Shooting 6 of my arrows and 6 of his at the same spot at 30, 40 and 50 yards – in each case I shot nice groups, but the Nano’s were all inside my C1’s closer to the centre so that sealed it. I spent the money and ordered them – for £300 a dozen they had better live up to the hype!

New Nano XR's dressed up with name labels by ArrowSocks.

I set them up in my usual colours and with some shockingly pink custom name labels courtesy of Arrow Socks and got to work tuning them. After weight matching the components and assembling, the all up weight is 375 grains – only 5 grains heavier than my Carbon One’s and the weight spread is less than a grain across the whole set. The spine testing was far more consistent than any other set of arrows I have ever checked and I was very impressed with the quality. 

I shot them for a while to tune for groups and adjusted the bow’s draw weight until they spined in perfectly and grouped the best. They act slightly stiffer than the C1’s at the same spine and the bow is set a shade over 57lb to get them to fly perfectly, about 1lb more than usual. At the same time as setting this I also took the opportunity to do a full retune – yoke, tiller, creep you name it and the bow is shooting like a dream.

Grouping at 45 yards after a bit of fine tuning!

During the testing and setup I managed to take out 7 of the 12 arrows by killing nock pins, shooting through fletches etc so they are obviously grouping very well and consistently! I’m going to have to shoot separate spots closer than 30 yards with these!

I didn’t have access to a chrono so used Archers Advantage which calculated the arrow speed at 280fps, and after initial testing this looked more or less correct so I printed off sight tapes and rocked up to my first competition using them – round 1 of the Welsh Field Masters Tour, a marked animal round at Fonmon Castle. My personal best on this round is 558/560 so I was hoping to at least equal this or maybe clean the round with a 560 but it wasn’t to be.

A few targets in, I snatched a shot to the right on a 35 yard target that was very narrow, dropping into the wound area and losing 2 points so I was on for a 558 but then I had issues with the 2 x 60 yard targets. Both went in low in the same spot, indicating that my marks are wrong at longer distances. Because of this I finished on 554/560 and in 2^nd place which I was still very pleased with for their first outing.

I managed to borrow a chrono off a buddy at the club and on checking, found that my bow was actually shooting closer to 275 so 5fps slower than expected. I printed off the marks at this revised speed and compared them to the ones on the bow. There was a slight difference but at long distance it adds up, making a 3 yard low difference at 60 yards which explains the low shots at 60. If there had been an 80 yard shot on that day it may well have been a miss!

These marks have been fitted and tested and so far everything seems to match up. I have shot distances from 15 back to 50 yards with them, and they look to be correct so it’s ready for the next outing! The next tournament is this weekend, round 2 of the Field Masters – a Hunter round at Red Kite. That course is quite challenging with some particularly exposed shots that always seem to be windy even on nice days because of the landscape. It is not a high scoring course but it will be a very good test of how these arrows perform and I am looking forward to it.

Check back in a week for the post-shoot report to see how it went!

Sorry Brigadier, time for a change..

Hi everybody!

As I mentioned in previous posts, I haven’t really gotten on with my Bowtech Brigadier despite my perseverance, and so I made the decision to sell it. I listed it up on the Facebook ‘Archery Equipment for Sale or Trade’ page as that seems to be quite busy, asking £300 for it or open to trades for Bowtech Centre Pivot bows.

I had a couple of responses, and one from an archer that had a blue flame 2008 Bowtech Commander in 50-60lb to offer. He was looking for a more Target specific bow, and the Commander is exactly what I was looking for in a bow – it is from the same family as the Guardian and very similar but it is 4” taller and has slightly different cams. I took the plunge and we set up the swap.

Now that is a bit more like it! I really liked this bow from the moment I took it out of the package which is a really good sign. It feels very familiar because I am used to shooting the Guardian and the condition was superb so I got to work setting her up.

The strings are fuzzy and a bit shot out, but they will do for the last few weeks of the indoor season and I will put new strings on it before the next indoor season rolls around. I served the section behind the string stop as this was bare and the string was getting worn from it, and I fitted a peep and served it in. The cams were a little under-rotated as well so I twisted up the cables to get this sorted.

I had a little free time one morning that I was off work so I went up the club and did a walkback to get the centreshot correct, and set the draw weight at 55lb. Shooting through paper gave a slight left tear but not enough to get into a twist over – the arrow flight looks fine so I left it alone for now. I had enough time to roughly balance the stabilizers and line up the scope to get a sight mark before I had to leave for the day.

I was able to go up to the club the following evening and got there nice and early, so decided to shoot a scored round to get a feel for what this bow is like.  I shot 2 ends of sighters and then went into a Portsmouth round and started off with a string of 6 inside out 10’s  and shot a consistent round, finishing on 583/600 which is only 2 points off my personal best. On the recurve 10 it would have been a 596/600.

I was very impressed with the performance of this bow, especially considering it was its first serious outing and it has only had a rough setup the day before.  I really enjoyed shooting it, it didn’t feel like hard work at any point and the draw cycle is great. The Guardian and the CPXL have slightly harsher draw cycles, but they are both faster bows so that is to be expected.

My only criticism of the Commander is that it is quite heavy. It is a tall bow with extra hardware for the centre pivot mechanism which adds weight, but with the stabilizers balanced it feels ok. Fatigue may become an issue on a long round, I did make a few sloppy shots from my bow arm getting tired on that 583 but it was shot quickly, in a real tournament everything is a lot slower so there is more recovery time between ends and I expect it won’t be such an issue.

I am never thrilled about letting go of a bow, but on this occasion it was the right thing to do and has paid off. I have a new bow for Target that definitely suits me better and is a dream to shoot. Unfortunately it has come as the indoor season is coming to a close, but that gives me all year to get new strings on it, get them settled and tuned in ready for the next indoor season.

 So there we are.. the Insanity CPXL for Field, the Guardian for 3D/Bowhunter and the Commander for Target - perfect!

The Plan of Attack for 2014

As the indoor season winds down and the Field season approaches, I’ve been thinking about what goals to set myself for the next season, and what it is going to take to achieve them. To that end, I have developed a training plan for 2014 that will look at the main points that I need to improve and work on for the next year.

The Archer..

My general fitness is pretty good, and over the last 4 months or so I have begun to exercise regularly again. I enjoy running and run around 20k in an average week, plus gym exercise so I have lost 1.5st since September and I am in much better shape with stronger cardio than I was last year. This should make a difference when fatigue and endurance becomes an issue as the day wears on.

I would say that by biggest obstacle that I need to overcome is confidence. I need to trust my shot sequence and know the shot will go where I want it, and do not let doubt or worry interfere with the process. Physically my shot is quite strong and consistent but it is not perfect. The main points that need to be addressed are bow hand positioning, and release trigger action.

My bow hand position has changed in the last year. I tried a more relaxed hand but I found it hard to repeat so I went back to having my fingers pulled in out of the way. I have a little tension in my hand from this, but I find it easier to repeat so I am going to stick with this and practice keeping a strong bow arm after the shot so that I do not collapse and drop the arrow which I am prone to do from time to time.

Release wise, I do not punch the trigger as such but the release is not as smooth as it could be so I am working on activating the trigger from increasing the tension and pulling through it. This seems to be working and my indoor scores have improved from this so I am going to dedicate a few sessions to solely this.

That leads me on to a big change - the way I practice. When I go to the club I generally just end up shooting arrows. Most of the time it is just end after end of shooting at a target - all good practice no doubt but it doesn’t have much value in training specifics. This year, I am going to use each session to focus on one particular aspect each time . And make better use of blank bossing to focus on these without the pressure of holding on a target.

 

The Equipment…

All of my field archery equipment is high quality, and I cannot see any reason to change anything on my field bow - I am happy with all of it so I need to do a little fine tuning to squeeze the maximum performance out of what I have.

I am 100% satisfied with my Insanity CPXL for Field, and unless there is a quantum leap in technology I can see me shooting it for a long time. I have given the bow an overhaul, making sure everything is clean , the parts that move do and the parts that shouldn’t don’t! The strings have been cleaned, waxed and burnished down ready to face the elements. The only thing I haven’t done is creep tuning so I will sort that out before the first field shoot.

Arrow wise, I’ve been tempted to pick up a dozen top of the range arrows such as Easton X10 Pro Tour or Carbon Express Nano Pro but I think I can still get more out of my Carbon One’s yet, so I am going to stick with them for 2014. Before this season begins in earnest though, I am going to strip them down, refletch them all from scratch making sure they are as weight matched as possible and for the first time ever, I will spine index them..

Indexing is something I have never bothered with before, but I feel I am reaching the level now where every point counts so I want every advantage possible. No arrow is perfectly uniform, and the spine does vary on them so you will find that the arrow shaft is slightly stiffer in one plane than in all others.  Spine testers to accurately verify this range into the hundreds of pounds, so I decided to make my own - No bad for about £25 all in!

The arrow is sat on bearings so it can rotate freely with little resistance, with a dial indicator accurate to +/- 1 thousandth of an inch resting on the arrow. A 2lb weight is hung on the arrow, and the amount it bends is visible. As you rotate the arrow, you will notice the needle will jump indicating the stiffest plane of that arrow. You mark that plane with a dot/sticker and fletch your arrow so that this plane is vertical.

The theory behind this is that arrow movement on release for a compound is vertical, rather than horizontal as seen when shooting off fingers. By making sure that the stiffest plane is aligned to this on all arrows, it should be more forgiving of an imperfect shot and ‘fliers’ should be reduced. I put my arrows on the tester and sure enough a stiff plane was easily visible. A few of the arrows were almost correctly aligned already but most are off, so this is why I will be refletching them all.

Once this has all been finished, I am going to go to a practice evening at St Athan’s gym with the Llantwit Major Archers to make use of their large indoor facility for a walkback test, and verify my long distance Sightmarks under ideal conditions.  Where else can you shoot back to your max distances indoors!

Hopefully, all of this should make for a strong, successful and higher scoring 2014 – fingers crossed!