So you’ve practiced hard and have arrived at the tournament. There are a few approaches you can take. My preference is to be social and enjoy the experience. You’ve trained hard and the tournament is the icing on the cake. Relax and be convivial with your fellow archers. When you get to the line, focus and make the shot you’ve practiced thousands of times. Tournament time is not the place to ‘try something’. If it isn’t working, it is because you’re doing something differently than you’ve done in practice. It could be that you’re a bit off physically. Or more likely, you’re a bit nervous, keyed up and want to shoot well. On the line your entire focus is on the middle. Every possible distraction does not exist. It is you, your shot and you’ve made the shot you are going to now execute so many times, it is going to just happen.

Does this mean every tournament will be just as you practiced? Of course not. But, the more you compete, the more you’ll develop a way to make your tournament similar to practice. There will always be nerves to deal with and things that do not go as planned. That is the nature of tournament shooting. Keep a positive attitude. Learn from and then forget the last shot; good or bad. Keep shooting the shot you’ve developed over all those thousands of arrows. Add em up at the end and get jazzed up for the next time you get to bring your skills to a tournament!

I often ask students what kind of scores they shoot. More often than not, they do not have an accurate answer.

What is a proper baseline for scoring? It is the scores you shoot in tournaments.

So if someone were to say to me, ‘I average 280’, but it is in practice, not timed and with no pressure, I take it with a grain of salt.

The crucible of competition unmasks every wart in our shots, be they mental, physical, or form related.

If you truly want to understand how good you are, if you are improving and by how much, it is important to understand what are your baseline current scores.

Tuning the bow is something every archer wants to do when they purchase equipment. There should be a distinction between tuning and a proper initial set up.

When getting new equipment, you should ascertain what is a decent match between arrow and bow (arrow spine). Properly place the rest on the bow to match the arrow diameter. Acquire a string which allows a proper nock fit. Establish an initial brace height within the recommended range of the manufacturer.

Now go and shoot!

Tuning is the process of optimizing equipment to the shooter. Learn to shoot before attempting to tune. Why? If you are not making consistent shots, every shot may leave the string differently. This causes a vicious cycle of incorrect adjustments. The archer is always the biggest variable in the tuning process.

So…………..DO establish a good initial set up. DON’T worry about tuning until you become a consistent shooter.

How often do you check your arrows? A cursory inspection should be done after every shot.

Slightly flex carbon arrows and listen for creaking or cracking sounds. If you hear something, that arrow should no longer be shot. Look at the nock end for signs of vertical or horizontal cracking. Look at the point end to verify the point is firmly seated against the shaft and has not been blunted by unexpected objects in the target.

A visual inspection of aluminum shafts should be done as well. Check the point and nock ends of the arrow. You’ll often see skilled archers spin shafts to verify straightness if they suspect an errant shot was not due to the shooter.

If you are shooting tight groups, checking your nocks and fletches should be standard operating procedure after every shot! Be aware of an arrow nock which feels different while being nocked on the string. The nock should be replaced immediately if it feels different from the last time you nocked the arrow.

Shooting accurately demands attention to details such as these. But it goes farther than that. These are safety issues. Failing to pay heed to your nocks and arrows can lead to a dry fire, or a broken shaft upon release.

One of the things I see very often with beginning archers, both adult and junior, is equipment not suited to learning the basics of the shot. For recurve archers, a beginning weight should allow you to shoot without undue strain. Most adults would be well served with a bow of less than 30#, at their draw length. Young children should not be over 20#, at their draw length. Teens should select bows in the mid 20# range. These are all approximations and a coach will be able to guide the individual based on their specific needs.

If you are in the Chicago area, or visiting, I am accepting new archery students for instruction, equipment evaluation, tuning and set up. My focus is currently Olympic Recurve. I work with archers with little to no experience, through expert level archers.