I think I should stop putting time expectations on the frequency of my posts, given that this is the first of 2015. Happy New Year!
In my previous post, I had just bought a second-hand riser but had not yet used it, intending to put it away as an extra Christmas present to open. That plan went out of the window when Mrs EA saw a wanted post on the Archery Equipment for Sale UK Facebook group asking for a riser that would be suitable for repainting. As the post was from the owner of ArrowSocks, a deal was done involving an amount of cash and a set of custom wraps for Mrs EA!
The 'new' riser is an SF Forged+, which is a great intermediate riser. With my existing 28lb SF Premium Carbon limbs fitted, I felt an improvement over the old Premium+. However, it soon became clear that there is a difference in the limb mounting geometry between the two risers, as the cast of my arrows at maximum limb bolt adjsutment was leaving me unable to reach 60yds reliably, when I could manage to do so with my old riser. Time for some 'heavier' limbs!
I had been shooting with the 28lb limbs for about a year, so I was about ovedue for a step-up. This time I went for a new set of limbs, the SF Premium+ Carbon limbs at 32lb. These appear to be essentially the same as my existing limbs, but with a revised paint-job, and they certainly improved my range. As you will know if you have read my previous posts, I am a string-walking barebow archer: I can now shoot at 60yds with point-on-gold and three-fingers under with room on the string to spare. 80yds is achievable by using my arrow rest as a reference so 70m should be fine, but I have yet to try 90m/100yds.
There have been some other minor equipment changes in the past few months. I did buy a smaller (large as opposed to X-large) Black Widow tab, and that felt more comfortable than the one I had been using. I also picked up a platform version of the same tab on the Facbook group and I now perefre to use this when shooting outdoors, as I need an under-the-chin anchor point to get the longer ranges. When indoors I use a corner-of-the-mouth anchor point with the non-platform tab, otherwise I end up string-walking a stupid distance away fron the nocking point. The other addition was an extra 200g weight on my riser to help keep reduce the amount of backward rotation after release. I already had a 350g weight on the lower stabiliser mounting point, but this one is attached onto the middle position.
In terms of shooting acheivements since December, I haven't really moved on much after winning the handicap medal at the Surrey Indoor competition. I didn't really get going on the indoor rounds as I missed many of the weekly sessions due to being away from home more than usual, either for work or more frequent trips 'Up North' to visit family. Outdoors I managed to maintain second-class scores on all but a couple of occasions, but I didn't expect to make much progress during these colder months.
A couple of weeks ago I stepped-in to help out one of our club members - Dave - who is working towards becoming an AGB Level 2 coach. Part of the course requires that the candidate works with a couple of 'improving' archers to identify their goals and to work with them on achieving these goals. There are a number of sessions where the candidates come together and this coaching is observed by AGB assessors to make sure that it is being delivered correctly and to offer advice wher necessary. Unfortunately one of Dave's improvers had a nasty accident where he severely lacerated two of his fingers and was therefore unable to shoot. Thankfully he has since revovered enough to get back on the shooting line, if not back at his previous capacity.
The first of these assessment sessions was held a couple of weeks ago at an indoor venue, and formed the first part of a full weekend session for the Level 2 candidates. Dave started by checking and listing my equipment, then discussing my short, medium and long-term goals. He observed me shooting for a few ends than started to make some suggestions to improve my techinique. The first was the placement of my feet to improve my stability. Next was my hand position on the riser grip. This felt very odd at first, but the change he suggested resulted in an immediate improvement to my groupings. Tridh, one of the assessors took a particular interest in me, as she is a former World champion field barebow archer and I was the only 'improver' shooting barebow. She suggested that I might need a little more weight in the bottom of my riser, as it was not quite sitting vertically in my hand before drawing. More shooting and more feedback made for quite a tiring morning, but I came away with a feeling that I had learned something.
Now that the clocks have gone forward, we are now able shoot outdoors at our club on two weekday evenings (only one of which I can attend due to other commitments) as well as at the weekend, so I have had a few more opportunities to put into practice the revised techniques. It appears to be having a positive effect, as I have managed to set new Personal Best scores for both the Warwick and Long National rounds. My score for the Long National was only eleven points away from a first class score, so I am hopeful of crossing that particular barrier in the not-too-distant future.
One of the recent saturdays was set aside for a public Have-a-Go day. We were busy most of the day and everyone went away pleased with the opportunity to shoot. There were some so keen that they rejoined the queue a number of times to have more turns. I was particularly pleased that there were lots of youngsters who were keen to emulate Katniss (or other on-screen archers) but were not disappointed when they found it wasn't quite so easy at it looked. We look forward to welcoming many of our visitors onto our forthcoming beginners' courses.
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