Gotta love this site.
I'm pretty much self taught and I've made plenty of mistakes over the years. I've got my good mate Benny Nganabbarru who got me into my longbows, and along with his wisdom and help, and since being here on Tradgang with the wealth of knowledge so freely shared, my learning and sucess has accelerated heaps.
I’d been shooting well over our summer, consistant and accurate, a tennis ball was in trouble out to about 30-35 yards. I would hit it probably 30-40% of the time, and the arrows that missed were still awfully close.
But just of late (this winter) something changed and my accuracy dropped off badly. I was shooting fine for height at various distances, but my east west was not good at all. I was all over the place, but usually hitting left, and anything up to 10 or 12 inches off. And it was me, as it was happening with both my bows. My groups that have been pretty consistant and tight, were not good at all.
Damn frustrating to say the least. Being a tad un-well with some virius, the cold weather, and a bit of arthritis creeping in probably don't help much either.
I could not work out what I was doing, and it was giving me fits.
Anyway, I did some searching here on Tradgang, and found some ideas, and tried them.
Turns out wearing a thick warm coat had stopped me from naturally getting properly "into" my anchor, my grip on the bow had changed, and I was not getting my drawing arm elbow consistantly aligned in behind the arrow.
Well I worked on these points over the last couple of week or so, and lo and behold, it has worked!!! Back on track. Got frightened tennis balls again, and boy-oh-boy does it feel good. Will need to maybe find a less bulky warm coat though.
I think I sort of knew these things, should have known the coat was a different constant, but I guess I couldn't see the woods for the trees.
Thanks to all at Tradgang for all the quiet help over the years. Brilliant site and brilliant people.
Best
Lex