Stickbow Target Archery Forums

1st training suggestion
week 44 – Monday, 25 to Sunday 31st Octobern
Mondayn
- physical condition improvementn Stretching (10:00)n warm-up exercise before jogging. Make sure that your muscles are slowly brought to their “heavy duty” capability by starting with walking on normal speed, increasing your walking speed until you want to start to run but slow down again. Repeat this 3 times and than start to stretch legs by making longest possible steps by keeping your chest (upper body) vertical. Repeat this about 5 times. Than start to run slowly ..
slow jogging (10:00)n
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

- shooting stylen Identify your individual shooting sequence (15:00)n Give yourself time to write down the sequence of your shooting. Start with your presettings – position of your feets, orienation of your chest, your sholder positions, your head position etc. Than recall the things you do when you start up your shooting. Put the individual steps into a sequence and write them down.
- body balancingn Static position – identify your body alignment (static) (10:00)n Place yourself in front of a mirrow and observe yourself how your body looks like when you move slowly into your shooting position. Do it 3 times – than close your eyes and repeat it once more. At the end of the movement open your eyes and compare whether your body is in the same position as after the first 3 times.

- equipment tuningn nonen
Tuesdayn
- physical condition improvementn Stretching (10:00)n warm-up exercise before jogging. Make sure that your muscles are slowly brought to their “heavy duty” capability by starting with walking on normal speed, increasing your walking speed until you want to start to run but slow down again. Repeat this 3 times and than start to stretch legs by making longest possible steps by keeping your chest (upper body) vertical. Repeat this about 5 times. Than start to run slowly ..
slow jogging (10:00)n
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

- shooting stylen Identify your individual shooting sequence (30:00)n Check your written memo with you phyisical shooting. For this, start up shooting with 3x 6 Arrows on a distance of 5- 10 yds. No target face; do not care about your shooting result – the position of the hits or the grouping. Than shot 1x 6 arrows, registrating what you are doing and speeking it out loud. Take your time; you should need for this 6 Arrows at least 4 minutes. Watch out for small things in your way to shoot and record them also. Monitor your procedure and identify changes – e.g. duration of aiming, drawlength, anchorpoint, position of feets, alignment of your shoulders and position of your head. If you have the possiblilty, use a video camera to record your shooting and than watch yourself.
- body balancingn nonen
- equipment tuningn nonen
Wednesdayn
- physical condition improvementn Stretching (10:00)n warm-up exercise before jogging. Make sure that your muscles are slowly brought to their “heavy duty” capability by starting with walking on normal speed, increasing your walking speed until you want to start to run but slow down again. Repeat this 3 times and than start to stretch legs by making longest possible steps by keeping your chest (upper body) vertical. Repeat this about 5 times. Than start to run slowly ..
slow jogging (10:00)n
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

- shooting stylen Remember your last training and the things you have identified (15:00)n Give yourself time to write down the sequence of your shooting. Start with your presettings – position of your feets, orientation of your chest, your sholder positions, your head position etc. Than recall the things you do when you start up your shooting. Put the individual steps into a sequence and write them down.
Compare your results with your Monday notes. The target of this exercise is to make yourself aware about what is going on with you while you shoot. We will repeat this type of exersice every now and than in order to check ourselves again.
- body balancingn Static position – identify your body alignment (static) (10:00)n Place yourself in front of a mirrow and observe yourself how your body looks like when you move slowly into your shooting position. Do it 3 times – than close your eyes and repeat it once more. At the end of the movement open your eyes and compare whether your body is in the same position as after the first 3 times.

- equipment tuningn nonen
Thrusdayn
- physical condition improvementn Stretching (10:00)n warm-up exercise before jogging. Make sure that your muscles are slowly brought to their “heavy duty” capability by starting with walking on normal speed, increasing your walking speed until you want to start to run but slow down again. Repeat this 3 times and than start to stretch legs by making longest possible steps by keeping your chest (upper body) vertical. Repeat this about 5 times. Than start to run slowly ..
slow jogging (10:00)n
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

- shooting stylen Test your memo (30:00)n Place yourself in front of a target. Preferable, the centre of the target should be on the same elevation as your arrow when you pull your bow. Distance to the target max. 5 yds.

Get somebody to lead you by reading the sequence of shooting to you as written down on wednesday. If you don´t have access to asistance, read it by yourself and follow this instructions. Do it 1 x 6 arrows with open eyes, than repeat the whole exercise with closed eyes. Be aware if something is missing. If so, make a note to your memo and correct yourself.

- body balancingn nonen
- equipment tuningn nonen
Fridayn - physical condition improvementn go and have a swim! (Alternative do the jogging exercise). Try to swim continous for about 15 minutes. Than relax 5 minutes and repeat once moren
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

- shooting stylen (15:00)n Can you repeat your Thrusday corrected memo out of your mind? Try it. Doublecheck if there are any missing things / or if you find a different wording. If so, modify your memo once more.
- body balancingn Static position – identify your body alignment (static) (10:00)n Place yourself in front of a mirrow and observe yourself how your body looks like when you move slowly into your shooting position. Do it 3 times – than close your eyes and repeat it once more. At the end of the movement open your eyes and compare whether your body is in the same position as after the first 3 times.

- equipment tuningn nonen
Saturdayn - physical condition improvementn Stretching (10:00)n warm-up exercise before jogging. Make sure that your muscles are slowly brought to their “heavy duty” capability by starting with walking on normal speed, increasing your walking speed until you want to start to run but slow down again. Repeat this 3 times and than start to stretch legs by making longest possible steps by keeping your chest (upper body) vertical. Repeat this about 5 times. Than start to run slowly ..
slow jogging (10:00)n
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

- shooting style (30:00)n Your written memo should be ok at this stage. Make it to your personal guideline, like a prayer that you repeat everytime when you shoot. Start to speak it out loud, until you have memorized it. Repeat it at every shot you going to make in future and control yourself whether you still listen to it. This “prayer” will be also a help to identify problems in your sequences. We will make a check in the next week, whether important components of shooting styles are part of your personal sequence.

- body balancingn nonen
- equipment tuningn nonen
Sundayn - physical condition improvementn Stretching (10:00)n warm-up exercise before jogging. Make sure that your muscles are slowly brought to their “heavy duty” capability by starting with walking on normal speed, increasing your walking speed until you want to start to run but slow down again. Repeat this 3 times and than start to stretch legs by making longest possible steps by keeping your chest (upper body) vertical. Repeat this about 5 times. Than start to run slowly ..
slow jogging (10:00)n
- mental exercisesn Focusing 5:00 (3 times per day)n Focus on something that draws your attention could be a big letter of a sign or someting else in a distance of max. 25 to 30 yards. Try to look as intensive as possible ont this “target” and identify details of it – colour, shapes, specifics. Do this for about 1 minute. Relex afterwards for about 1.5 minutes and repeat the exercise a 2nd time. Do this 3 times per day – preferable in the morning, at noon, and in the evening.

Take your time to give comments / suggestion to the exercises.

Have fun and enjoy your archeryn Martin

Wow Martin, I'm impressed. You have given this a great deal of thought and already put a good bit of work into it.

Will report back on how things are progressing.

Dave

The shooting style exercise is one I've tried before, with a bit of frustration, because it is hard to capture an entire form in a few steps.

I like Martin's additional category of "presettings" -- that helps to create a more complete picture. And, I followed his lead and added a few more categories: rhythm, places to watch out for (or, you could call it 'good points that I don't always remember), and known problems (an outstanding issue I am currently working).

The body balance was also revealing -- there are additional 'steps' in there that I've never consciously decided to do.

The focusing is very interesting -- I thought it would be a 'mental' exercise, or maybe an 'eyes' exercise. But I feel it in various muscles -- not at all what I expected

ArcCaster, when you start to focus on something, your mind begins to ignore influences from your surrounding. By this, silent signals send from your body seems to become more intensive - so you start to recognise them. A very good development indeed!n
The exersises of this first week should help you to be more aware about your body in total - to have a picture about the status you are in.

Hmmm -- day three asks that we rewrite our shooting sequence, and compare it to Monday's.

This gets interesting -- you can think of your release, for example, as consisting of several distinct steps -- or you can think of it as a single step of one continuous motion with a few steps in that flow.

Seems like your choice (several simple steps, or one more complex step) will affect your thinking and your shot.

Well, it is kinda late Friday night, and Thursday and Friday have both flown by without much thought of archery training. It is indeed a sorry state of affairs. So I looked at the schedule to see where I can catch up. And there is no catch-up day. Sounds almost like rhythm-based shooting to me -- as long as you stay on rhythm, you are fine -- but if you get off, you are in trouble. I wonder if it might be better if the steps were 'event-based' -- not so tightly synched to the calendar -- maybe 5 steps a week -- and know what the next week's plan is far enough in advance that if you get through the 5 steps in 5 days, you can start next week on the 6th -- and if life sidetracks you, you can catch up on the 6th and maybe the 7th. In a month of archery, I bet there would be some weeks you would get ahead, some behind, but by the end of the month, you might be close to being on track.

ArcCaster
I think you are right. I am going to modify the training plan in such way that there is more flexibility in it. What I learned sofar from trying to write a training plan is that there are certain aspects which influences / are influenced by more than one aspect wherelse others are quite independently. So, a importent part of the training plan experiment will be to identify the relationships between this aspect and to learn how to work on them.

@alln Now as a summary for the first week exercise, the target was to learn more about yourself and the status you are in. The intended connetion between the several exercises was to increase your capability to focus on something - and idealisticly - to use this for the selfanalysis of your shooting style. The bodybalancing exercise was to make yourself aware about your natural "selfalignment" tendency and the "unnatural", forced position you might be in. In fact, if there has been big differences between open eye positioning and closed eye positioning than your bodyalignment needs some improvements.

Martin, nicely-designed first week! The repetition and the interleaving of the theoretical and the practical really helps to close the gap between what I THINK I am doing and what I am REALLY doing. It is an eye opener, and a great way to start!n
Thanks!

Martin, I am finding the detailed documentation of the shot process really helpful. As I try to repeat it, I am finding holes in it -- and modifying it. And as I modify it, I am consulting my local coach to make sure my modification doesn't break something else. And as I modify it, I am updating the documentation -- so who knows -- perhaps soon I will have a consist repeatable shot
That is a great starting place to build on!

Good Day, first of all I would like to thank you Martin, I would start doing that as early as tom
I'm so glad that there is something like this for those who have ventured in this Sport without the trainer. Bless you martin and I would try to get back with you on my progress!

re: focusing.

Focusing on the smallest spot as possible, so intently that everything except that spot goes out of focus, produces some amazing results. Am still not sure of sequence, tho -- if you start such focusing at predraw, it may affect your ability to use the arrow as a reference. But, focusing AFTER you reach anchor seems kinda last minute, and may require a long hold time. What are your thoughts -- when do you start such focusing?

If you are using your arrow as a reference try the following:
First draw to you full draw and find the referring reference point at the target / butt where your arrow point is pointing at. memorize this spot. Than lower your bow - without shooting that arrow. Restart to your predraw and focus on the reference point. Than go to your full draw, doublecheck your aiming at the reference spot with your arrow point, check your bow-alignment and stabilise your draw. Calm down and increase slowly your drawforce until you are at your best anchor point. Than release your arrow.

My reference is not as firm as that. I shoot split-vision, which means I see the arrow (kinda) at the same time as I see the target. This actually is almost the opposite of focusing in on a small spot -- it is a very broad focus where you are trying to see something a few feet away and kinda peripheral at the same time as something maybe 50 yards away and centered. The only reference point I use is the center of the target. I am thinking that it may be necessary to use these two techniques one at a time, one after the other.

ArcCastern
Try Gap-shooting but if you are comfortable shooting split-vision, stay with it
I shoot split-vision up to 55 yards then gap-shoot after that, I'm not a very good gap shooter as it has caused some target panic problems in the past. I just don’t feel that comfortable with it
I was told by someone several years ago that you can only do well on spots if you gap-shoot, Redbow also shoots split-vision so between us I think we've proved that theory as being bit of a myth, I’m pretty sure Larry Gap-shoots with great success so it's worth a considering.

A word of caution
If you shoot a lot of un-marked 3D and animal rounds and you decide to gap-shoot you will then have to also learn how to estimate yardage more accurately, because gapping off a 60cm (square) face is much easier than trying to gap off a 3D deer. I've found that too much shooting on spots using a gap system can affect your confidence when you switch back to un-known distances, you start get doubt’s about what you’re seeing in your split-vision and it all start going horribly wrong, I'm happy with split-vision because I can switch to marked and un-marked rounds fairly seamlessly
Martin is very knowledgeable and it’s great to see him helping people on this site, I think he would agree your choice of aiming needs careful consideration.