Ky_Bowhunter

Before I shoot I pay attention to every part of my body. I start at my feet. Some people dont realize that standing in the same stance every shot will make a difference. Like I sad I start at my feet, get the stance that feels familiar, back straight, draw back(slow and easy)and then make sure your grip feels natural, elbow not completly straight, but not very noticably bent,shoulder relaxed,back relaxed as much as possible. only you and the target. seeing only the target and nothing else. dont look at the sight, look through it. squeze the trigger without thinking about it, keep your focus on the target. The arrow released,your focus still on the taget. You hear the arrow hit and lower your bow.

55#recurve

For focus, imagine yourself in a feild of grass, lots and lot's of grass, now focus it down to one blade of grass, yellow grass if it's more like a target, then on that one peace of grass focus even further until you see a small microscopic afid crawling around on that peice of grass, that afid is your target. If you need something else to focus on then choose something else, but for focusing down on one small peice of a big picture, it help's you focus on a small spot on the target. For holding the mental game, you must simply not think of anything, don't pay attention to anyone, not even yourself, talk to people but don't pay attention to what they are saying, shoot with in yourself, if you shoot with in yourself your body will do what your subconcious is telling it to do, if you get in a zone you can feel it, it's almost like you have tunnel vision, your muscles won't get tired, your eyesite becomes very sharp and focused, and you smack the heck out of the ten. All you have to learn, is to shoot with in yourself, if you ever watch koreans, or any other solid shooter, they don't shake, the don't look like they are thinking of anything but what there eye's are looking at and that is the ten, ten, ten, ten, ten. Through the hole shooting sequence you must only focus on the ten, noting else, not your shooting form, release, nothing but a microscopic spot in the ten. That's enough rambling.
Good luck.
Dylan

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Edited by - 55#recurve on 01/18/2002 21:11:26

55#recurve

<font color=green>SHOOT WITH IN YOURSELF!!!!!</font id=green>practice is the time to work on form only during practice, it must be natural and unthought of when competing.

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Edited by - 55#recurve on 01/18/2002 21:14:55

FLHunter

Well said 55!!!! I find that in practice that the smaller the target the more heighten my concentration. I will often shoot for dime sized stick-on dots posted at random around the target to see how many I can hit out of 10 arrows in an inning. It works!

Ossage

Though to go more to the point of the original question: stress and competitiveness. The problem is that to be extremely effective you have to execute. At some level, really caring about what you do is a negative. It depends on all sorts of things, how easy is the execution etc... Jeff Cooper the Gunsite guru has made the point that to overcome fear one has to become angry. At a certain level that kind of thing works. But much of what he is involved with is training, which is to say giving people the basic set of skills which are essential to competence. Mastery is the other end of the spectrum. The appeal of Zen to the Samurai was that they felt to overcome fear they had to let go. A fascinating book along that path is &quot;The Sword of No-Sword&quot; about a warrior Tesshu. Tesshu is aparently a real person who lived in the generation imediately following the baning of swords, so he carried on in great mastery, though unsatisfyingly to an extent, at a time when the fighting was over. None the less he is a great connection to the warrior time. What they went through to become at one with their goal is amazing. Much of what is expected of us in the normal world is exertion. People want us incredibly atuned to a role: &quot;will you have fries with that&quot;. We are all constantly after something. A lot of passionate caring will only make it impossible for you to be in the moment when the time comes. Wanting to win really badly won't help you shoot the shot.

akbowhunter

tribal, im not any where near a competitive shooter { did one 3d shoot in my life} but my hunting partner that got me into archery told me once. &quot;practice does not make perfect only perfect practice does&quot; ive lived by that ever since. every shot i take is ONE shot. nothing more nothing less. if you get tired its time to stop. contunuine to shoot will make for bad habits.
Ron

billygoat

There's a good article on this topic in this months Petersons Bowhunting Magazine.

Jeep_Man

Howdy again (this is my whopping 3rd post!)
I'm no expert bowhunter (haven't killed one yet with a bow) but I think I have a pretty good idea about what to think about.

Several of the guys mentioned shooting with their eyes closed. I never did that, though for about 20 rounds or so, I concentrated on my form more than where I aimed/hit. For a finger/barebow shooter, I tried thinking &quot;Ok, body in the right position, eye on the left of the string, get rid of that third finger, aim...concentrate on that target...concentrate, concentrate, concentrate (that's the key, concentrate on where you're trying to hit...no, where you are going to hit so hard that it hurts. Then I just let those fingers go QUICKLY. When I flinch, I usually do it before I let go...if you do that, just take a break (5 seconds max) and then do it again.

Now when I shoot, Everything is just natural. I'm pretty stable (tip of the arrow doesn't move around allot) and I can group within around 3-5 inches at 20 yards. I haven't yet practiced seriously at thirty, though that is up for tomorrow

Anyway, that's it from an amature bowhunter I would strongly recomend shooting fingers...you think about the yardage before you even draw, so once you draw, all you HAVE to think about is that point...nothing but that point

-Nate

Finger shoot it man, just use your fingers.