Form improvement - accuracy suffering

[EHK]

Has anyone's accuracy ever suffered despite improvements in form?

Over the last 2 or three months, I've made a real commitment to improving my form.  I can feel it starting to come around - better alignment, better back tension, fewer collapses.  However, my accuracy was better when I was just "flingin arrows" for lack of a better expression.  Maybe I'm focused more on the form, and less on the target...I don't know.  Anyone else ever experience this before?

[LongStick64]

Eric

I think I know what you are talking about, even though my form had started to look picture perfect, I still wasn't as accurate as I hoped, after some trial and error I found that I needed to cant the bow a little bit more.

[JR Williams]

I think that this is pretty normal. This is why most coaches advocate taking the accuracy out while working on form ie. Blank Bale. This way you can totally focus on form and when it is grooved in you can then get back out there and start re-wiring the brain.

[McDave]

If you're just shooting to improve your form, which is a good idea, your accuracy is secondary and probably won't be that great.

However, if after you have put in your form practice and are shooting for accuracy, your accuracy is still not up to par, you're probably doing something to throw it off that you're not noticing.  There are a great many things that fit into this category, of course.  For me, I check my bow hand alignment to make sure I'm not torqueing the bow, my string hand alignment to make sure I'm not torqueing the string, my shoulder alignment to make sure it isn't pointing off to the left of the target at full draw, I make sure my string hand is pulling straight back and not pulling at an angle up or down, and of course that I keep pulling through the shot and am not creeping.  But that's just me, because those are the things I don't do correctly on a regular basis that screw up my shot.

All those things that I check are still part of form, of course, but they are things that I know I don't always do right, from experience.  You'll have your own checklist, which will probably be different from mine.  If I'm doing everything I should be doing, the arrows should be making a nice little group down there somewhere, if not centered on the bulls eye, whether I'm totally focused on aiming or not.  In fact, if you'll read Clickerman's series of posts on this forum, you'll get a different perspective as to whether we should be focused on aiming much at all.

[moebow]

I agree!  IF you are working on form, TAKE HITTING SOMETHING OUT OF THE PROCESS!!!!  Working on form will nearly always decrease your accuracy initially.

Form is the hard part, hitting something is the easy part.  The trick is to GET YOUR form BEFORE you start trying to hit something.  Even "checking on your progress" while working on form will set you back.  Be patient -- one step at a time.

[Green]

If you have a small camera that'll take video, make video of yourself shooting 3 shots each from the front, rear, and side.  If you're able to have it shot from above, so much the better.  If you've been working on your form for awhile you'll be able to see things in your own shooting.  If you're stumped....post a youtube link up here and one of the coaches will be glad to help.

FWIW I struggled (bad) with trying to monitor accuracy the whole time Moebow, and then Javi were coaching me.  I finally relented and shot just for form, not worrying about where the arrows hit until things started to come together.  Look at it this way, your new form is almost certainly going to cause you to have to re-tune your arrows so you might as well relax and enjoy the process.

[BobCo 1965]

Two steps back in accuracy when working on form, then three steps forward. Don't let time be an issue. Accuracy will come (when it is ready).

[momo]

your changing thing to make your form better  remember your changing thing your use to so you might lose some accuracy for a while but stick with it and the accuracy will come back and be better then before

[EHK]

Thanks for the encouragement guys. Shot a 3D over the weekend, and shot fairly well for my standards, but definitely felt the form breaking down more often than I would like, so it's not firmly "grooved" yet.  Back to the blank bale work.