How Will You Perform in Competition?

I am currently reading “The Foundations of Winning Golf” by Jon Sherman. (I know, I know, golf again? But if I looked to the archery literature for inspiration, where do you suggest I look?)

I often use golf as a metaphor for archery in that there are many similarities; both are individual sports, both involve “shots” that have pre-shot, post-shot, and shooting routines, etc. Also, their mental games are quite similar.

But golf and archery, while similar, are also quite different. In this case when addressing “How to win?” those differences are important. In golf a shot can hit a sprinkler head and bounce off in a wild direction (or a cart path, or . . . ). The wind can be quite different up where the ball flies than down where the shot starts. Archers have to contend with wind that may be different along the route of the shaft but rarely due to elevation.

And, the key difference is that in golf, you never have to shoot the same shot twice in a row (except in the dreaded pitch up a steep slope that doesn’t make it to the top and rolls back down to your feet). In archery you may be making the same shot (same distance, same target anyway) for the entire round.

So, archery is a sport with more consistency built in. And that can be used to inform expectations. (Expectations are not necessarily good, but being human we all have them.)

One aspect of this is as we learn and grow as archers our performances become more consistent. All other things being the same, we become more consistent as we become “better” as an archer.

Consider the following situation. Your state championships are based upon a 900 Round, so as you prepare, months in advance, you shoot dozens of practice rounds. Now the conditions vary during these rounds, but being a fairly expert archer, you shoot a high score of 867, a low score of 848, and an average score of 858. So, what score can you expect to shoot during competition?

Here the difference between competition and practice comes into play. In our minds the competition means, what? More? This can lead us to “try harder,” or some other adjustment to your standard practice to score better than you might. You already know that thoughts of winning or losing are counter productive. But what should you expect?

The rule of thumb is you should expect to shoot your average. I was one of those overly optimistic types who thought things like “If I shoot my best, I could win!” That is true, but how likely is “your best” to happen? Pessimists think about that poorest practice round and envision that happening again (accompanied by thoughts like “Here I go again!” of which I had a great many.

You actually set yourself up for failure by thinking a good start presages a “magical round” in which you shoot your best, then a poor end leads you to think the worst is yet to come, and . . . well, you know the rest, don’t you?

There is a reason that elite archers “shoot their averages.” When you shoot rounds, the scores pile up on a graph in a standard Bell curve, with the most scores around the average score and few scores at the extremes. In itself it tells you that scores close to your average are way more likely than scores far away.

Two Bell Curves–The wider on showing a less expert archer, the narrower on for a more expert archer. The curves indicate two different averages.

Now this pattern is important. If you really want to win an event, look up what the average winning score has been for the past few years and compare it to your average scores (smart arches/coaches log both practice and competition round scores as there may be a difference). If your average score is the same as the average winning score for that event, I say you have a 50% chance of winning. This is because half the time you shoot below your average score and half the time you score above your average score.

If your average score is lower, then you have a point of focus for your practice over the months leading up to the competition, looking for improvements that lead to your average going up. If your average is the same, but you want a better than 50% of winning (it still depends on which of your competitors decides to show up, for example) then you want your average up over that of the average winning score.

All of this is well and good, and I recommend you teach these things to your serious students (it is always best when they can motivate themselves in practice than you just urging them on) but you can still get in your own way, mentally. And this always leads to lower scores. (I know I am a past master of getting in my own way . . .maybe even still a present master, in that just because you know better doesn’t guarantee you will do better.)

Interestingly, the key to staying out of your own way is the same for golf as it is for archery: immerse yourself in your process. Your focus needs to be on your pre-shot routine, your shooting process, then your post-shot routine . . . rinse and repeat. Thoughts about winning and losing, judgments like “I am such a jerk!” etc. have no place.

How to Shoot v. How to Win

Most archery books are what I call “how to shoot books.” Whether they are flogging the “secrets” of archery (Hint: archery has no secrets, none), or how to shoot better, whatever the topic, the vast majority of the book will be on the topic of how to shoot (usually how to shoot differently, but how to shoot).

So, how does one become elite, a winner? These books only address the rudiments. How to shoot shots is probably step 1 in and such process, but what about: how to shoot consistently, how to practice, how to keep records, how to manage your competition schedule, how to manage your thoughts while shooting . . . I could go on, but I think you get the point.

This is why I wrote “Winning Archery,” the subject of which book is everything you need to learn how to win . . . besides how to shoot arrows from your bow.

I don’t think much if anything in it is out of date, but if there is it should give you a lead on what to look for. And since a single chapter on the mental game, Chapter 6, is a bit skimpy, I wrote “A Guide to the Mental Game of Archery” to provide more substantial information.

If you pick up a copy (both available on Amazon.com) let me know what you think.

Here’s the Table of Contents of WA:

Winning Archery

Preface  Do You Want to Learn How to Win?
Ch 1  The Elements of Winning Archery
Ch 2  Assessing Where You Are
Ch 3  Winning Equipment
Ch 4  Winning Technique
Ch 5  Winning Physical Training
Ch 6  Winning Mental Training
Ch 7  Winning Practice
Ch 8  Planning to Win
Ch 9  Developing Your Support Team
Ch 10  Competing to Win
Ch 11  Navigating the Archery Organizations
Ch 12  Competing Internationally
Ch 13  Questions and Answers
Appendices

Can You Shoot Wooden Arrows from a Compound Bow?

The question above is the topic for today, along with “Should you shoot wooden arrows from a compound bow? or its rough equivalent “Why don’t people shoot wooden arrows from compound bows?”

Can You Shoot Wooden Arrows from a Compound Bow?
Most compound archers would say no . . . and they would be wrong. There is a perception that there is so much energy stored in a compound bow that the wood arrows would break if used. It is true that there is more energy storied in a compound bow than in longbows and recurve bows of the same peak draw weight. It is also true that upon loosing of the bowstring, the force at the back of the arrow is whatever the holding weight is, roughly 20-35% of peak weight. That force slowly ramps up as the string moves back toward the bow (following the force-draw curve back). By contrast, a longbow or recurve bow slams the peak draw weight to the back of the arrow immediately upon the loose. So the shock applied to the arrow is much greater than for a compound bow.

If you don’t believe me, check out the article by traditional archery icon Dan Quillian in Archery Focus magazine (“Wooden Arrows – Truths and Myths” in the Jan/Feb 2001 issue. BTW, Dan included a photo of a 5X-25/25 five spot NFAA target shot with wooden arrows (see below).)

Should You Shoot Wooden Arrows from a Compound Bow?
As I mentioned above this question is roughly equivalent to “Why don’t people shoot wooden arrows from compound bows?”

Just because everybody does something, doesn’t mean it is correct. That is called the ad populum fallacy in traditional logic. And even though there are plenty of examples of just that thing in our “monkey see–monkey do” sport, in this case they are correct, but the reason is not that wood arrows can’t handle the energy of the bows. The actual reason is consistency. The reason everyone switched to aluminum shafted arrows once they became widely available is consistency. When shooting with wooden arrows today, it is still emphasized that one needs a set of carefully matched arrows. They need to be matched in weight, spine, length, diameter, etc. When aluminum shafts become available, it was like magic. They were so well matched that creating a matched set of arrows was no longer such a “big thing.”

A telling technique from the latter days of the dominance of wood arrows was the practice of “clocking arrows.” After you did everything you could to make your arrows match, you would then take notes. If one arrow in the set tended to hit the target low, it would be labeled “6 o’clock” (most didn’t include the “o’clock”). If it tended to land left it was a “9,” if right a “3,” if low and right a “4:30.” Archers would then check their clocking of each arrow and compensated accordingly when shooting them. If a “6” was next in order, since it landed low (toward 6 on a clock face) then one would aim a tad high. One learned how much higher to aim from experience; the better the matching of the set, the smaller the corrections.

Now, so as to not mislead you, I worked very carefully to create matched sets of my favorite Easton carbon-aluminum shafts. With a fresh set of shafts (every year or two) I would fletch them, add nocks and then weigh them and also weigh the points. I would then join the heavier shafts to the lighter points etc. The goal was to get the set to with a grain or two from top to bottom (a grain is 65 milligrams, or 1/7,000 pound avoirdupois). If a point was too far out of range being heavy, I would take a file to the back of the point’s stem, lightening it up a bit. I then would weigh the completed arrows and make two sets of six arrows as closely matched in weight as I could.

In all honesty, I was not a good enough archer that that effort was necessary. My thinking was if that level of effort was made, then I didn’t have to worry about my arrows being a cause of my group dispersions. That was all me, baby! And, well, it gave me something to tinker with over the off seasons.

The Importance of Handwriting when Keeping a Performance Log

I have advocated, as have most other archery coaches, that serious students keep a written logbook for all of their archery data, the most obvious reason for doing that being there is too much information to keep in memory. I go so far as to give each new student a small spiral bound notebook as a starter.

My students always want to use their smartphones to type in the data but I insist that they handwrite in their notebooks. I have offered more than a few reasons for this practice. If students write notes in some notebook app in the phone, how do they organize the information? How do they find the information they need later?

In a notebook divided into sections (the first/foremost being “The List”) they can find their tuning data, their equipment modification notes, their venue notes, their goals, competition plans, etc. by flipping to the right section and then searching from there.

I offered the opinion that handwriting engages the brain more so than does typing and makes things for memorable. (I once hired a typist and I “empowered” her to correct obvious typos, but she told me she doesn’t even see the words as words, they are just channeled from the manuscript to her keyboard fingers!)

My arguments were of the “hand waving” variety as I had not much scientific evidence for the superiority of handwritten notes, at least until now. Voilà!

Handwriting Boosts Brain Connectivity by Claudia López Lloreda
<subtitle> For learning and memory, pens may be mightier than keyboards

Writing out the same word again and again in cursive may bring back bad memories for some people, but handwriting can boost connectivity across brain regions that are implicated in learning and memory, a new study shows.

When college students wrote words by hand, connectivity across the brain – particularly in brain waves associated with memory formation – increased compared to when students typed the words, researchers report January 26 in Frontiers in Psychology (Source: Science News, February 24, 2024)

The full article is available in that issue of Science News or the more detailed, sciency article is available in Frontiers in Psychology. Pay walls are to be expected.

Sometimes a Blurb is Enough—Archery Basics

I write book reviews in this blog to help you decide whether or not to read the books reviewed or to recommend to your students, but sometimes a blurb is enough to make that decision.

I did not buy this book (100 pages, US $22.95, free shipping, self-published) and here is the blurb.

Archery Basics: All About Archery is a simple and easy-to-read book in which you’ll discover top tips and practical advice to learn all about archery including:
Archery: An Introduction
Popularity of Archery
Relaxing with Archery
An Overview of Archery
Archery Equipment Tips for Beginners
Determining Arrow Length
Measuring Draw Length
Preparing for Archery Training
Practice Tips
Techniques Improving Your Accuracy
When to Replace Your Strings
Fitness for Archery
Preparing for Competition

I am seeing more and more of this type of book. Somebody thinks that their archery hobby is a foundation for giving advice to others just starting out. Maybe it is or maybe it isn’t but these books are usually overpriced and overly simplistic. Their claims are . . . optimistic, e.g. “Discover Top Tips,” “All About Archery,” “Your Quick-Start Guide to Success” . . . right. Often “archery secrets” are to be “exposed/divulged,” and if you recall . . . there are no secrets in archery!

Navigating This Site

When newcomers find this site, they typically find my most recent post and then scrolling down they find the one before that and then the one before that, like a gigantic roll of toilet paper.

Just going down, down, down, down is not a good way to explore the site and find things you are interested in. There is a “word cloud” in the right hand column (it’s in blue, right over there →); each of the words is a term used to describe other posts. If you click on a term you are interested in, such as “Buying,” or Coach Training,” all of the posts that have that descriptor will be brought up for you.

And, if you don’t find what you want, send me an email for the topic you want me to post on and I will do my best.

Aiming Like Howard Hill

Howard Hill (1899-1975) was the finest practitioner of the longbow that this country has ever seen. Some random facts about Mr. Hill: He won 196 archery tournaments in a row; he was observed stringing/bracing a 100-lb draw longbow while seated in a chair; and he did all of his trick shot performances (some of which are still available on video) using 80+ pound drawing long bows. Just for comparison’s sake, I once tried to draw a 100-lb longbow and I am not sure to this day that I even bent the bowstring, let alone the limbs.

This post is for the express purpose of explaining his novel aiming technique about which there is much written, most of it wrong. The man explained his technique clearly in a number of books, so this shouldn’t be all that hard.

Howard Hill’s Aiming Technique
He called his technique secondary vision or split vision aiming. To my mind it stemmed from his starting out as a purely instinctive archer. (This is a misnomer, there is no such instinct; such aiming is no more instinctive than shooting free throws in basketball is—it is rather learned.) He was an excellent shot shooting that way but then he learned point-of-aim shooting and was quite as good of an archer that way.

His personal aiming technique was designed to facilitate both target shooting and bowhunting as he was avid about both forms of our sport. The big difference is that in target archery the target is of a fixed size and it does not move. In hunting, the size of the target varies greatly and it does move.

Hill’s fusion of instinctive and point-of-aim shooting was to focus intently on the spot you wanted to hit, as in instinctive archery, but then place an imaginary point of aim near your target that you place your arrow point on. You do not, under any circumstance, look at your arrow point or at the position your imaginary POA is placed, hence the term “split vision” in that the center of your target/desired hit point is in your primary vision and your arrow point and imaginary POA are in your peripheral vision.

Details Often Overlooked
Hill explains in great detail that he worked to create a situation in which his imaginary POA was very close to the desired hit point: he used heavy drawing bows, he used a high anchor (minimizing the angle between the arrow line and line of sight), and he canted his bow (again minimizing the angle between the arrow line and line of sight). His strength was legendary. I already mentioned bracing the 100-lb bow while seated as an example. Hill had a 125-lb weight on a cable over a pulley and “drew” that weight many times daily. He didn’t depend upon natural strength; he developed the strength he needed.

The high draw weights he preferred were so that his arrows “dropped” little from their original line of flight, making aiming much easier.

Concluding Remarks
Mr. Hill was also a charismatic and very handsome man. He created his own archery business which still, I believe exists, run by his children and acolytes. He was an originator of archery golf, which I can’t imagine would be allowed today on most golf courses.

His technique in flight shooting was, unusual to say the least (see below), but he set numerous records in doing so.

His modern counterpart is Byron Ferguson.

If you want to learn more about Mr. Hill, I can recommend “Howard Hill, The Man and the Legend” <sub> “The World’s Greatest Archer” by Craig Ekin. This book, typically, is OOP (Out of Print) but you may be able to find a used copy (I did).

A Fount of Archery Wisdom

I woke up this morning (January 1, 2024) feeling every one of my 77 years and for some reason I recalled some Archery Focus articles about archery over the age of 55. (One of the sterling aspects of our sport is that it is available to people aged from 8 to 88.) Somehow I talked Dean Pidgin into writing on this topic, as he qualified and if you are unaware, he is legendary in the compound world. Prior to rotator cuff surgery in one shoulder and then again in the other, Dean won about 35% of all of the tournaments he entered. (That is at least 35 times more than me.)

The wisdom in Dean’s articles is not alone as there are thousands of articles in the Archery Focus archive. When we took over the magazine over in 1999 our editorial policy was that each article had to help archers or coaches get better, period. So, we turned down a lot of puff pieces, news articles, etc. We were a bimonthly and news was better posted on the Internet, said I.

The reason I am bringing this up is that Claudia is still pondering what to do with this vast wealth of archery wisdom, Currently, however, you have an option to access this archive.

If you go to http://www.archeryfocus.com and click on the button “SHOP ARCHIVES” you will be taken to the page where, for US$160, you receive access to all of the published articles, forever.

These articles are in PDF format, so you can download them, print them out for easier reading, or read them on your computer, tablet, or smartphone. There is an index listing the titles and authors of all of the articles, which is searchable as it is a simple text file.

If you download articles, we ask that you not share these with others as we are still trying to earn money from all of our work. There is one exception. Coaches may print out any of those articles to share with their students (please do not share the PDF versions).

And, of course, I hope 2024 is a good year for you, personally as well as professionally!

Steve

Is Breathing Part of Your Shot Sequence?

Most elite archers have a breathing pattern as part of their shot routine. It effectively becomes a rhythm anchor IMHO.

I first learned of this when reading Rick McKinney’s magnum opus “The Simple Art of Winning.” I consider this book a foundational work for Olympic Recurve coaches. If you haven’t read it, I recommend you get a copy, read it, and then read it again, and maybe again. There is much wisdom in it.

The still brilliant Rick McKinney is one of the few elite archers who has written a serious archery book.

In Rick’s book he describes the breathing patterns of quite a number of elite archers. Since then studies have shown that maximum stillness occurs at full draw not on top of a full lungful of air, but with 20-25% of that air released. So, if you start at the moment of release with 75-80% of a full breath being held and work your way back, you can develop a breathing pattern of your own or for a student.

I quickly found out that being an asthmatic compound archer made quite a difference. While many of the Recurve archers drew as they inhaled, then let out that 20-25% as they hit anchor. Compound archers spend a bit more time at full draw and I found myself running out of air before release, which due to my asthma creates a panicky feeling in me. So, I breathe out on the draw, then in at anchor with the letting out of the 20-25% at anchor.

Breathing impacts more than just your shooting rhythm and stillness at full draw, it can be used as a nostrum for anxiety. During your post shot routine or even your pre-shot routine, if you find your thoughts drifting to what might happen (Danger, Will Robinson! Danger!) a short stint of controlled breathing can bring your anxiety level down.

A pattern I have seen recommended by elite warriors is “box breathing,” which is breathing in for a count of four, holding that breath for a count of four, then exhaling for a count of four and holding there for a count of four. Repeat as many times as is necessary.

A personal favorite of mine I learned as a way to control the hiccups. You take in a normal breath and hold it for a count of three, then you inhale to your maximum and hold that for a count of three then exhale slowly. Repeat as necessary.

There are quiet a few “breathing exercises” like these, so you can look up others so you have a variety to choose from or to offer your students.

Of course, you can personalize these patterns by changing the counts to whatever works for you. There is no magic here and I think focusing our attention on our breathing, a function necessary to stay alive, so very, very important, allows the heebie-jeebies to clear out of your head, but that is just my guess.

Any experts on breathing out there? I would love to have you chime in.

Say, Then Do

As in, say what you want them to do, then ask them to do it. This is the mainstay of coaching changes. This may be completely obvious, but then it may also not be. When coaching a physical activity there is a pattern that seems to be more effective than others. It goes like this: describe what you want your student to do, then have them do it. It is best that what they do involves feedback, either from you or, better, that they can sense on their own.

Once they have achieved some competence in the task, form element, whatever, it is key that they practice this new thing at their next practice session and the next and the next . . . whether you are involved or not. This is the Achilles’ Heel of not-so-serious archers you may work with. If you meet with them one a week, say, and after teaching them something new, a week later, their form/execution is unchanged, the usual cause is they didn’t solidify that learning by “doing their homework.”

Of course, we don’t want to turn a hobby into a job, but the goals they are seeking are theirs not ours, so I extract a commitment from the student to do X number of repetitions of the new movement on Y days before our next session. It is very important that they write this on their List (I have written about The List before). So, if they practice and if they read The List before each practice, as instructed, they will be reminding themselves of their commitment.

If your student fails in such endeavors several times, it is likely that they are not actually a serious competitive student as you have been treating them and your expectations and methods have to change. (Recreational archers are motivated by “having fun” and often times doing drills or lots of repetitions of things isn’t fun, so they do not do them. Don’t blame them, it is your mistake in assuming they are serious competitive archers when they are not.)

Let’s go back to that serious competitive archery student. What else can you do to help him/her learn this new move? One thing you can do is get them to describe what they are to do vocally. Putting it into words is part of a time honored learning technique of spreading the learning out into a number of different faculties. (Having them write their description in their log helps, too.) Another thing you can do is link the new move into older learning, here that being the student’s shot routine. By carefully placing the new move into their routine, you create causal links to the new move and to the next step in line. Shot sequences are classic “one thing leads to another” chains. When placing the new move carefully in the place of an old move or by breaking one of those links and inserting the new thing, it is important to identify what follows what. Remember way back when you played albums to death? Near the end of each track, you knew which song came next. That was because the end of the prior song was the link you forged to the next. This is what is needed in an effective shot routine.