The Think Tank

Today was the first day of the Oregon State Indoor Archery Championship, and it marks the first tournament I have competed in since 2002.  Chinook Winds Casino in Lincoln City is playing host to this years tournament.

Our friend Debbie Lane is the person who convinced me to start shooting again.  She was shooting in this tournament and I decided to join her.  Debbie arrived early in the day and went to practice early and was in the cabin when we arrived.

Maure came with Mom and I this weekend and Shannon, her brother Kevin, her mom and dad (Sheri and Brad), and Joel all came to watch me shoot today and cheer me on.  I really appreciated the show of support from everyone and wanted to make sure I said a special “Thank You!” to all of them.  It really meant a lot to me.

Today I shot a 300 with 49 X’s.  For those of you who may not understand the scoring, I’ll give you a quick overview. You can see at left a plot of all my shots today.  The white area is worth 5 points, the first blue ring is worth 4, the next is worth 3, etc.  The innermost ring in the white is called the X-ring, and it counts as 5 plus an X.  X’s are used as tie-breakers.  One round consists of  60 arrows, so a perfect score is 300 with 60 X’s.

I haven’t seen the final scores from today, but I feel confident that the leader will be in the 58-60 X range, so my 49 X’s should be well short of that.  However, I feel that given that I’ve only been back for three weeks or so (after not shooting at all for seven years), I shot pretty well.  My personal goal for today was to shoot a 300 with 50 X’s or more, and I came pretty close to that.  Better than the score, I felt that I was performing my shots very well for the most part.  Three or four on every end felt about perfect and hit pretty much dead center, which is encouraging.  A couple weeks ago I was lucky to get 5-6 perfect feeling shots per day, so this was big improvement.

In fact, today was the first time since I came back that I shot a 300, so that was good.  By the competitive standards of my youth, the 300 alone is a fairly low bar, but I’m more or less starting over here so I’ll take it.

I definitely feel like I can pick up tomorrow where I left off and improve on it a little bit.  Hopefully I can kick the X’s up some and get over 100 X’s for the weekend, which will satisfy my original goal.

I shoot the 2pm line tomorrow as well.  Any and all positive thoughts that you throw my way will be greatly appreciated!

The rest of this post is just a shooting journal for my own records.  Read on if you like, but its doubtful there will be anything very meaningful in it.

I started out just a little bit nervous this morning, not the bad sort of nerves, just enough to keep my own my toes and keep my thinking about my form.

The first few ends were pretty solid, although I think I dropped a X on each of my first two, which was a trend I would continue for most of the day.  By the third end or so I was getting into a good rhythm and  my form was feeling good on most every shot.  I struggled a little but on the 4th arrow in particular, which usually meant a narrow miss, but all in all I was doing a really good job of staying strong and pulling through with good back tension, and keeping my bow arm under control after the shot so my wheel came down on my hip.  I replaced arrows #1 & #3 because they were both shooting low.

I struggled on Ends 4-6 quite a bit.  I did a pretty good job was letting down when I fought too much, but I still struggled through a couple that were really poor shots.  One of them in particular went high at 1 o’clock on the 5-4 line, which was pretty scary as it was way out there and was horribly executed.  That really woke me up.  I started paying special attention to my form, aiming as best I could and mostly just waiting for the good shot, feeling the form before I released.  When I got into that mindset early, I knew the arrows weregoing to  pound the middle before I even drew up.  Those were almost always inside-out X’s, many in the same hole dead center.

Towards the end, around end 10, I got really tired and my back was hurting from the back tension, which is a good sign, really.  It did make coming through my shot difficult, and I started seeing some left and right variation that hadn’t been there before.

I think part of that was in my hand, and part of that was probably a little bit of creeping and weakness in the release arm.  In those situations where I having to really work, I need to pay particular attention to keeping my bow hand relaxed.  Tension there usually translates into 3 O’clock and 9 O’clock liners or misses.

Also, practicing my finish-form, pulling my release arm around and simulating the position I want to be in after the shot helps to cement that form into my brain.  I need to do that at least once every end.

Today was the highest score I have posted since I started shooting again, and it was pretty much dead on with the personal goal I set for myself.  More importantly, I felt like I shot a lot of really good arrows today, without a doubt the highest percentage of well performed shots and inside-out arrows than I have shot since coming back.

For those of you who may not understand the

We left Friday night around 7PM because Maure had to work late due to a State inspection at her work.  The timing of the tournament is not terribly convenient, as Maure and I had to sacrafice tickets to two Blazer games, and last nights game turned out to be a helluva game to miss!  We did get to listen to game on the radio, though, cheering on our boys as they eeked out a win 106-107 over Denver.

I shot on the last line of the day, starting at 2pm.  Shannon and her folks and brother came to watch me shoot, and Joel made the trip all the way from Portland to watch me shoot as well.  I really apprecieted the show of support from one everyone.

I was a little nervous when I started, but not the bad kind of nerves, just the sort of quiet nerves that kept me on my toes.  As has been the story of my

Additional information: —————————————

Start date: Feb 26, 2011 11:05 AM Target: NFAA/IFAA Indoor Total score: 300 49 X’s