Trad Gang
Main Boards => The Shooters FORM Board => Topic started by: ozy clint on April 16, 2010, 06:42:00 AM
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at least until i've beaten this damn target panic and can shoot more consistently.
about 2hrs ago i lost a buffulo. i got to about 17m only to let fly with a lousy target panic shot. it hit him a bit low in the leg bone that joins the scapula. he was limping badly and i tried to get around him for a another shot but i couldn't get in front of him. i lost sight of him and circled wide but i didn't cut his tracks so i headed back to where i last saw him and i found him in a bunch of bushes. it was nearly dark by then. so here i am approaching a wounded buffulo in a bush in the dark. anything could have happened. luckily he crashed away from me as i was getting close. it was way to dark by then so i had to head home. i'll be back tommorrow to try and find him. i'll carry my gun i think. i don't trust myself with my bow anymore. i need to give up bowhunting and beat this target panic!!!! :mad: :mad:
i had a few draws and let downs while stalking and it felt comfortable but when it matters my target panic lets me down. such inconsistenent shooting isn't fair to the animal.
what a low!
beating target panic may well be the toughest challenge i've faced since i started bowhunting.
just needed to vent and to confess my poor shooting.
i'm off to crawl into a hole now! :(
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dont let it take over you these things happen fight throw it you will win. good luck
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The true power of the human mind, is in the fact that we - unlike any other living creature - are able to manipulate with our own subconsciousness. When you become truly aware of this simple fact and begin to bend your mind to your will... things will start happening.
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I think the best way to get better at shooting animals is to shoot more animals. Experience is the best teacher, and nothing else equals the experience of shooting live game. Of course you don't want to wound them, especially the dangerous ones, but perfection is not reality. Sometimes things go badly, and you just have to get over it and keep on keeping on!
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I've been having some trouble also. It seems like before the shot, I'm concentrating on trying to reach full draw and hit my anchor when I need to be completely focused on the intended target. Any ways I heard Jay Kidwell Instinctive Archery Insights book my help.
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I had TP. One of the hardest things I ever went through with my shooting. I have been TP free for about 3 yrs now. I read Jay's book, watched video's and read anything I thought might work. My problem was not getting to full draw. The instant my draw hand touched my face the shot would go off. Now I could come to full draw when drawing on my truck or house or something I knew I wasn't going to shoot, but if I knew I was going to shoot, boom, it went off before I was ready. I basically had to retrain my subconsious. I did it by drawing my bow on a target I intended to shoot, but not shooting just let down. I had to do this for about 7-10 days. I was then able to hold and shoot. If I had a relapse and the shot got away from me, I went back to the no-shooting drill. This is how I beat it but your case is probably different than mine. It can be conquered! Don't give up on something you enjoy. Good luck, Cade.
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That sounds pretty rough.
Keep your head up. You are among a large group of survivers of TP. "Hello, My name is Alex and I have TP".
You too can beat this thing. Have patience, be disiplined, and do the work to get back on your feet.
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There is no worse feeling than wounding an animal (bow or gun). I hope you find your buffalo.
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Try a clicker for now. You will be able to come to full anchor without that uncontrollable urge to let go of the string.
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tape a sight pin to your bow. At first when I tried this, I had TP so bad i couldn't even get the pin close to the target without letting go. I finally powered through that and I am now a better shot than I was before TP because I learned to hold steady and a controled release.
I almost did the same thing, I was in the same boat. Don't be afraid to try ANYTHING.
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Study Kidwell and do the exercises. Last I heard- he was seeing virtually 100% success with Olympic shooters dealing with TP. The button technique also helped me greatly.
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I also had a run in with TP.
You can get over it.
Used a Formaster and breathing exersizes.
Sorry about the animal,,,know how you feel.
Kia Kaha.
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I gave it up after I realized I couldn't keep it together anymore. Animals I have wounded, haunt me to this day, and will all the days to come. Its taboo to talk about this, but Iam guessing that there are many others similarily haunted by images of wounded animals limping away. This said, you may be able to overcome the live animal target panic--the only way I know is to shoot at live animals-- I would suggest red squirrels,- If you hit one, its a clean kill 99% of the time, If you miss, ---No harm done. Good Luck- you'll likely get it together--If not quit--- The wounded animal thing, sucks the joy right out of it.
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I had to completly change my shooting style to try to beat my tp.I had to what I refer to shoot like an olympic archer.My aim needs work, but by drawing to anchor with both shoulder inline with the target and a low anchor it utilizes my back muscles.I can anchor now, which was my biggest problem before.
I know your feeling about quitting hunting.I tell myself that alot but every year its like some primal urge to get out there.Best of luck with your shooting-Ray.
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Hunters with all weapons wound animals. I have had target panic at 400 yd with a rifle. That elk hurt just as bad as your buffler. Yes it sucks the joy out of it but I keep going.
For me, TP was helped greatly by doing exactly what Chuck said - practice, practice like our native ancestors did.
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hang in there mate think positive, i had this problem at one stage took quite a bit of work to get on top of it, i have some info that was very very helpful that i will try find in my old e-mails and ill forward it on to you.
also on top of that, i now shoot with a clicker...something i think is well worth having a play with.
hard luck on the buff...chin up
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i dont know your hunting history nor your personaality yet all i can do is drop my 2cents from my limited experience. i remember the first many times i hunted i was a ball of trembling nerves and my breath looked like a locomotive steaming down the track in the cold morning air.everything around me sounded like amplified though a bull horn,and i felt like a giant spotlight was on me .
well after several misses ,many blown opportunities ,and yes wonded animals to boot :(i was sitting in tall grass 8 yrds from a crazy lookin some kinda corsican ram "half curl" almost bsted me twice but to his demise he whent back to drinkin .i mentally slapped myself in the face and said its just a bow and arrows and there's your target just think through the shot and let it fly like youve done only about a 100,000 times before ,relax, breath,pick a spot, draw,touch that anchor hold!!! shot looks good release and "dont drop that dam arm"!!!!!OMG i hit him!!!!!!and just whrer i was aimin !!!! he ran 40 yrds and dropped dead!!!! OMG!!!! i did it !!!!! yeeee hawwww! double loung and the artery along his spinne . the best day of my life besides seeing my children born .moral of the story : you can do it i asume you doit every day on target. just get a grip and make a shot ! go to a game ranch . (lots of opportuneity ) work it out in your head its all there .
good luck and good hunting brother . its all just a journey tward "being the man we know we are"it starts from within . 2cents and a great memory of a great time in my life .for what its worth.
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i got in contact with jay kidwell. what a gentleman. i'm already seeing light at the end of the tunnel!
i can't wait to move home where there's lots of rabbits. as mentioned, it's kill or miss. i'll get there. thanks guys.
i was quite relaxed with the shot on the buff just my target panic took over when it mattered most.
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Best move by contacting J. Kidwell. Its an actual physiological-brain thing that can happen to any athlete; Golf, track/field, shooting sports, basketball/freethrows, football kickers. . . all the same issue.
With this entirely new world of Sports Psychology- they got it figured out. I know pro/Olympian athletes who have used the very same techniques and resolved it.
Actually training your brain to shoot DIFFERENT will resolve it.
Good shooting and hunting.
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If it's target panic, there are a bunch of good posts on this website regarding overcoming that. If it's what we call "buck fever", it happens to most all hunters, or at least those that care and are excited by the hunt. Those that don't get excited should probably go do something else. You obvously care. Don't give up! Try to talk yourself into calming down a little and going through the steps of a good shot and taking care of business. The business of making a good shot. Don't think about missing, what taxidermist to call, what flavor of sausage to make. Just take care of business. Make the shot! Rifle hunters screw up too when they (I've done it) let "buck fever" take over. You are not alone. Don't give up!
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This might sound like strange advice, but I actually read in the old Archers Bible from Fred Bear himself. He told about when when someones form is off, to use a bowsite to figure out your kinks and then go back . When I get to where I can't hit as well, I actually pull out my old compound bow with sites and shoot for awhile at targets. With the letoff, I have time to hold and figure out what I'm doing wrong. Usually about 15 minutes with a compound, I'm ready for my recurve or longbow again anyway. But I swear when I pick up my trad bow, I shoot better after shooting the compound.
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I wonder.... Is it target panic? An example of target panic would be when you shoot many arrows at targets, and it becomes increasingly harder to come to full draw the more arrows you shoot. Eventually, you become mentally unable to come to full draw, even though you are physically capable of doing so. That doesn't sound like what happened to you, unless you continue to experience the problem at targets other than the buffalo you shot at.
Could it be that you just blew the shot, without any deeper meaning to it? We all blow shots, and hope that when we do, it's not when we're drawing down on a prize animal, but there's no guarantees.
Could be target panic, but not if you're not continuing to experience the problem after coming home. Could be buck fever, but you've taken buffalo before, without experiencing that.
There are ways of dealing with those issues, but those issues are chronic problems, and dealing with them involves methods of breaking ingrained habits.
Dealing with an occasional blown shot is different; it involves an acceptance of the reality that those things will happen, and they won't have any effect on your next shot unless you let them.
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I had the same issues, Jay Kidwell's exercises and 10 days later I was back to my old self. Keep up the exercises and it will come back. I still draw my bows and do the figure 8s and aim at the TV from time to time, just in case it might start to rear its ugly head.
Keep at it and it will become fun again.
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is it possible that tp and buck fever are close brothers ? i mean think about it what is tp and wwhat is bf? the mind loosing controll of the situation.no? if i have tp twards a target(non liveing) im reacting to selfdoubt,fear of missing ,fear of looking like a arrow slinger,fear of geting a poor score or missing the target compleeetly, ect...if i tp on game : is he gonna bust me when i draw? will he jump the string? OMG thats the biggest :deer ect.... ive ever seen/shot at ....dont miss !!!! hurry up before he see's me!!!dont wound him !!! that would totally suck!!! does this make any sence or am i just overanalizing again? :knothead:
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All the same thing. The unknown variables; i.e. animal moving, wind blowing, cold, etc. are what athletes call "noise" or "distraction." The key is actually TRAINING your brain/thoughts to minimize the affect of "noise." This TRAINING is a part of our needed practice that few really do. You learn to build the mental/brain training into your shooting, then when the moment comes you do it. (Kidwell teaches you how to train)
I have had good success, and some failures. But even when I fail, I now know what I am doing and how to work on it. Keeps my confidence up (another needed piece of the puzzle I might add).
Good shooting and hunting
Dan in KS
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Feel your pain. I'm coming off the worst bowhunting season of my life. Hit 2 great bucks and found neither after days of searching and mental anguish. I was inconsolable, and furious at myself. But then I came home one afternoon and caught my 7yr old son peeing in the front yard while the neighbors watched, and relized I had other things to worry about!
The things I have learned: 1) Animals are even more resiliant than people (a friend killed one of the bucks 2 wks later that I thought I mortally wounded). 2) I was becoming too technical with my shooting and lost all natural instinct that we bowhunters have. And finally, 3) I hadn't killed much of anything prior to those hunts.
So take solace in the fact that whatever we hunt, its tougher than we are. Go have some fun. And kill some stuff and eat it, and share it with others.
The best thing to come out of it is that I have decided to have some fun with hunting again and regain my instinctive edge by making the move to traditional archery. I'm having a blast and I look forward to shooting again.
If none of that works let me know and I'll send my son over to pee in your front yard !
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lol beezer !!! arent sons the best ? they tend to either send us through the roof or bring us back to the ground.
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Clint, I was just pondering your post and thought I'd offer my 2 cents. It might not be target panic. It might be the fact that you're hunting something that could stomp the living stew out of you. And at a distance where you're very vulnerable. It may be that your sense of self preservation is overtaking your desire to take the shot. I certainly don't know if this is the case, but you might want to experiment.
Go hunt some rabbits. If you miss, no big deal, unless, of course you run across that big-fanged one from the Holy Grail. If you're having the same issues, feel free to ignore any more of my advice.
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I agree with Stokes. And any consolation? Sure. Coyotes need to eat too. Nothing is wasted in nature.
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I just now re-read your post and saw that you were shooting 17m with a Bob Lee? I'm pretty sure those are made in the US and so they probably shoot in yards. I don't think you can shoot metric with that bow. Next time be sure to shoot 18 yds and you should do OK.
Sorry, I couldn't resist that one, ozy. Thanks for the info on Kidwell.
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A couple opf years ago I found that I could not shoot at any deer that looked at me. One came straight at me and gave me a hard stare over. when it was leaving I tried a shot and stuck the arrow in the ground with about a 16" draw about halfway to the deer, 8 feet from where I was standing. Frustrated, I emptied my quiver at chunk of bark on a bank 35 yards away, five out of eight were in a tennis ball sized pack in the middle of the six inch chunk of bark and three an inch left. The next day I shot a fast walking buck at almost 30 yards, he never looked at me. TP is a mysterious thing that comes in many flavors, all of them bitter.
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fight thru it, it will go away. Trust yourself
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I feel for you. I have had bad tp for the past 5 years and have almost quit hunting the last 3 years during bow season. I just don't like gun hunting near as much.
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Get in touch with my friend Keith Karr, he had similar issues and went to both Rick Welchs and Rod Jenkins shooting schools. In particular, he found Rod's instruction to help him kick this develish habit!
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If this was a first occurrence, it probably wasn't target panic. Maybe a bit of buck fever, which is close to target panic. Both involve the brain short circuiting to somehow screw up the shot. Lots of good advice already offered to tackle either. Only you can decide which it is and the best approach for you. Good luck.
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I did what earthdog did, I started using a Formmaster and that solved my TP. It worked great for me.
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Don't give up! I suffer from TP too and I am overcoming it, it takes alot of work but it can be done. I understand the frustration, I have gone to drawing and anchoring with my eyes totally closed when the compulsion to release gets too geat. It is hard to overcome, but it is doable. I know with Kidwell's methods you can overcome this and your joy of archery will return. Hang in there!
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don't give up man!!! I just plain suck at tuning one of these stick-n-string bows much less shoot very good BUT I'm gonna keep on pluggin' away at it.
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Stand really close to your target and close your eyes and focus on form. Don't worry about aiming right now until you can feel your form getting back to perfect. Then start close and slowly back away from your target, practice your focus ... form then aim, I have to say to myself "that's my spot" to drill into my mind to not let my eyes flick away.
This is all academic at this point because aside from very small game (read mice, squirrels and toads) I have yet to harvest anything of note.
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Posting about it here is a giant step toward overcoming it. As one mentioned, it may be the danger of the game you were hunting. When hunting beig game taht could be dangerous if wounded, before you shoot figure out an escape route or safe place to go, then when you are ready to shoot you don't have that fear in the back of your mind. Contingencies -- always have a plan.
Most importantly, practice until EVERY part of your shot is absolutely automatic. If you have to think about form when you draw on an animal, you haven't practiced enough.
When you are ready to harvest game it is too late to worry about form or if you are a good enough shot. You have to be confident in your ability, automatic in your form and at ease in your situation.
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Originally posted by Big Sneaky:
I had TP. One of the hardest things I ever went through with my shooting. I have been TP free for about 3 yrs now. I read Jay's book, watched video's and read anything I thought might work. My problem was not getting to full draw. The instant my draw hand touched my face the shot would go off. Now I could come to full draw when drawing on my truck or house or something I knew I wasn't going to shoot, but if I knew I was going to shoot, boom, it went off before I was ready. I basically had to retrain my subconsious. I did it by drawing my bow on a target I intended to shoot, but not shooting just let down. I had to do this for about 7-10 days. I was then able to hold and shoot. If I had a relapse and the shot got away from me, I went back to the no-shooting drill. This is how I beat it but your case is probably different than mine. It can be conquered! Don't give up on something you enjoy. Good luck, Cade.
I had the exact problem as Cade and fixed it much the same way he did. I spent hours drawing and holding the bow as long as I could and then letting down.
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Don't give up, hang in there! As hunters there is ALWAYS a chance at making a less then "perfect" hit. We accept this and still continue to keep striving to do our best. It sounds like you are doing the right thing by keeping after him.
Keep your head up and keep plugging away my friend, IT WILL COME TOGHTER..you can count on it :wavey:
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I feel with you, and think you made the right desicion! It is very honorable to postpone something you love out of respect for other beings, and a desire to improve your self and regain control! You will be a great hunter for the future imo!
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Where there is will, there is a way. If one hunts, occasionally one will wound and not recover, whether it is small game like a rabbit or a squirrel, water fowl, pheasant, deer or buffalo.
Don't let your emotions get the best of you over your miss. It happens. It will happen again. Mistakes are made with work, raising kids, driving, or riding a bike. Most of us don't quit because we accept that as a part of life. You try not to repeat your mistakes and move on. It is the same with hunting.
Forgive yourself and move one. You have a plan and that is a good start. Remember, you are doing this because you enjoy it!
Don't mean to preach, but we have all been there.
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Well, if its anything at all I have TP also, even a World IBO Champ told me, you can beat it, but it never really goes away. So we have to work on it, my sub-conscience has to make the shot go off, you dont have to let the arrow go, just because you are on target. My friend went to several 3D's an never fired an arrow at a target. He just went to the stake , drew the bow like he was gonna shoot , then he would let down. Man is that hard to do!!!!! Try it, it might help you.