I’ve been looking forward to archery all week. I hadn’t gone now for about a month and that made all the difference.
Tonight, I found myself shooting mostly by instinct, rather than using the push pin sight. The other archers remarked how when I shot by instinct, especially at the further distances, my bows would quiver up and down in the air like a javelin, rather than fly by straight.
I suppose perhaps, that’s akin to throwing a curve ball or throwing a football with a spin. And they never seen anyone in class do that before. How I did it, I don’t know.
Of course, the further you move away from the target, the higher you must aim, in order to take into account trajectory. And by feel, how I increased the angle of the trajectory was not just to raise my bow, but by also dropping my right shoulder a touch, while aiming the bow higher.
Perhaps this is how one of my bows flew upwards in a swooping arc and then dropped down in such a sharp downward angle, that it tore into the target sheet. And because I was the last one in my group to shoot, everyone saw the path my arrow took and heard the sound of my arrow tearing into the paper. It was pretty awesome and we all ooh’ed and ahhh’ed and had a laugh. For this is probably a one in a million crack shot, I’m sure.
We closed the night with going 3 rounds, aiming for small turkey targets. The top score would win a special prize. Much harder than shooting a regular target, I only scored a three pointer. But that was enough to get me second place. The winner? A long time archer with his own professional compound bow, scoring 9 points. The prize? A big ass butternut squash! (it being Thanksgiving on Monday and all) Hilarious and fun.
I’m on my way to becoming a toxophilite.
No Comments