17. Bendigo ABA - Donald Invitational lead up

 04/06 - A beautiful sunny Sunday and everyone that usually hits the outdoor range has other plans. I had some chores, mowing mainly and it can take a lot of time, so the next decision was easily made. 

The beautiful sunny afternoon was calling and I did not want to waste it so I mowed half the lawn and making sure I got the important part, went and got the longbow out and hit the home range.  The rest of the mowing can wait until tomorrow. - 66 arrows.

05/06 - Home range 30 arrows, Due to the additional mowing, work, school pick up etc I ran out of daylight but managed a few ends.

08/06 - Indoor range 3D shoot - 50 arrows

09/06 - Home range - 66 arrows. I'm enjoying the walk back shooting, usually 6 arrows a run as I find that any more and I get a bit tired. After warming up, which usually takes two ends, I thought I'd go off each marker plus one at 5m and 48m. 

This is something I do once every time I practice, the rest of the time the distances are random where I shoot an arrow every 'X' number of steps, sometimes 5, sometimes 12 just so I'm not doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a consistent result.

I wouldn't normally take a pic of it but this is the best 'grouping' I've done so far. Above that is the view back up the range with the looming Otway weather closing in..again.

10/06 - At home 64 arrows

11/06 - Outdoor Range- 56 arrows. Enjoyed the day out as always and the stroll aroung white course was nice for a change. It was the first time I'd shot it in a non two day comp. Had a fairly regular three arrow round, but definitely not the best one arrow round. It almost took me back to my best average score when I first started. Definitely a form issue and some string plucking creeping in and something to work on tomorrow since it's a public holiday.

Found a leech in my boot when I got home as well, little bugger just managed to just latch on through my sock. Stemmed the flow and hoped that it doesn't get infected like the last one did, that was nasty.

12/06 - At home - 76 arrows 

Now focusing on this coming weekends two day comp in Bendigo. I've never shot there so another brand new to me course. 

I had a good hit out and instead of shooting one shot and walking back, I took two or three, sometimes six from the same spot. As anyone reading these words can attest, there is always one distance that just doesn't work for you, I have a couple that I miss more times than I hit, one is around 26-28m so I spent a couple of ends around there and also late 30m's.

I notice if I stray from or get lazy with my shot sequence, the shots go left so I'm playing with the timing of each 'step' and focusing on where I'm looking and what I need to see in my shot window. The glasses are helping and also hindering, something that will take a little getting used to.

14/06 - 72 arrows at home.

15/06 - Indoor ABA comp - 29 arrows - A crazy night with a few things going on, I wasn't fully concentrating and the scores showed. I did notice that my heights were good on all distances, a little low on target one which was a group 5, otherwise there were a few that were 'just out'. I busted an arrow as well which is a reminder to take that split second longer to focus on the release and not pluck the arrow to it's doom.

Bendigo 2 Day Competition

The comp at Colac only seemed like yesterday but the month has slipped by in a heartbeat. Beauty, here we go again!

Really looking forward to getting on the road. 

I love the whole process, starting with the planning and packing the car, sorting the menu and doing the shopping, gear prep, which is usually gluing arrows, and taking stock of the toolbox, checking the spare string is in the kit and not forgetting to always grab a handful more arrows 'just in case'. 

Ticking boxes and going through the camp set up in my head knowing that last time I had a brilliant idea that would make the weekend go just that teeny bit better and that I have since forgotten. 

Competition round up - 113 arrows inc a couple of practice shots to warm up a bit.

What a good weekend and my first look at the Bendigo course and it's well set out with plenty of room and to be honest I had a bit of trouble guessing the distance on some of the targets. 

The weather was cold in the morning but the rain held off until overnight on the Saturday so that was also a bonus. for most of the competitions except the first in Ballarat & Mt Clay and the last in Geelong, there is usually some rain so it's a bonus when it stays away.

I had a familiar shoot group, MS whom I've shot with a few times now and a young fella from Colac who has taken to the outdoor shoots in his first away comp. Away we went and the first day was one good and one not so good round. 

I missed a few I would have normally gotten and the negative mindset drifted in for the first half a dozen targets and thankfully things started working themselves out. 

Day two was better with two consistent rounds and ended up with what has become an average for me of around 260.

Competition wise....always the bridesmaid. Geoffrey had two solid rounds and had me by 78 points at the close of day one and had another blinder first up on Sunday (unbeknownst to me of course) and I was going into the final round chasing 120 to break even, and I'm glad I didn't know to be honest as it can play on your mind if you let it.

My old theory of everyone has one bad quarter came into play and Geoff's afternoon round was well off the average of the last three. I chased and caught up but he got me by 18 points in the end. 

The weekend tally of shame was 14 washes, 11 second arrow shots and 3 third arrows. 

Didn't deserve to win with that kind of track record. It was a lot of fun trying though and I lost 2 arrows doing it.

                                                 

21/06 -  A couple of days off, mainly due to rain and freezing cold wind. Home range - 50 arrows

22/06 - Final indoor for the school term, It was kind of a fun night and I shot better than I have in a while at indoors so happy with that. - 28 arrows

23/06 - 01/06 Woke up with a sore elbow the next day so basically rested it for a week and a few guys have arranged an outdoor shoot Sunday so I thought I'd better see how the elbow felt shooting before heading out in the morning. 

I decided to run with the old saying 'Aim small, Miss small' and added a few small spots on the butt's main face and also on the side in the hope that if the whole target is smaller the groups will come in a bit..in theory.

This will be good for group 1 practice, here's a pic of the first round and a pretty good summary of my relationship with group one targets.

02/07 - Outdoor shoot - 54 arrows. 

The elbow was a little sore still but not enough to effect the shooting in a noticeable way, another week off and it will be good to go next weekend in Donald. 

Overall happy with the three arrow, missed a few in the one arrow though and it was the annoying misses, just under, just over, I plucked the string a couple of times when my form was lazy and the classic 'that went where I was aiming' shot. 

This sounds like what you want it to do but when allowing for the slightly left flight along with the paradox it shouldn't go there...but sometimes it does. 

I want to see my scores consistently over 500, ideally over 560 but that's a good day out and those have been hard to come by but you can't hit a target you don't have.

Really looking forward to next weekend's invitational 2 day event hosted by Donald Archers, weather dependent practice this week and perhaps not push the elbow just to be sure.

FL14 Tally:

This period  -  420 arrows @ home

                    -   107 arrows @ indoor range

                    -   110 arrows @ outdoor shoot 

                    -   113 arrows @ competition

2023 Total Arrows - 3351

Casualties - 7 - (4 broken, 3 lost) 

Carbon Casualties - 3 - (1 Broken, 2 Lost)