My First Recurve

[madmav70]

#4649

I have owned a Hoyt compound for about 10 years now and a friend of mine convinced me to go traditional, so I went out and bought a Samick Sage takedown recurve. I’m used to the 60# draw of my compound and the guy who sold me the recurve suggested I start out light with my recurve since I am a newbie to traditional. I took his advice and started with 30# limbs (the highest pound limbs he had available at the time). Admittedly I thought he was crazy because I’m 6’4″ 230 Lbs and pretty avid about going to the gym. But after going out to a 3D range with 21 targets, I started getting shakey on my draw after target 14, with about three shots per target. I’ve returned to that range numerous times after to practice and get better at pulling back the bow. I also shoot traditional cedar arrows with fletchings on a traditional bear hair rest. The trouble I am having is my arrows consistanly shoot left. I have tried changing the spine, adjusting the nock, and even drawing the string to the left to counter-act it, with no luck. Does anyone have any advice that might help. At this point i’m willing to try anything. Even thoughts about owning a Samick Sage are welcome.

[Frank H V]

#32660

Congratulations on joining the trad-bow group. Don’t worry about the poundage for now. In a month or two that bow will feel really light. When you get to where you are just dominating the bow, then you can move up in weight. Don’t be too anxious, it’ll come all by itself.:D

Good shooting.

Frank

[Ben M.]

#32892

madmav70,

I am certainly no mentor on archery or shooting form, but I too had trouble with my arrows consistently hitting left of my targets. For me, I had to re-realize that while I am right-handed, I am left-eye dominant. I’m a pretty darn good shot with a rifle (my grandad had us kids picking off cicada husks suspended from fishing line with a BB gun when I was 10), but shooting both-eyes-open with the bow completely changed things for me. For the first couple months with my bow I had to force myself to slow down on my shots and close my left eye. I now prefer to shoot both-eyes-open, but I still find that if I’m fatigued or not completely focused I have to close that left eye to put the arrow in the target.

This was my experience.

-BGM

[Ben M.]

#32897

I should add to my post above that I was and still am using a properly tuned bow/arrow setup.

-BGM

[Jeremy Holden]

#39507

I will second the above advice about checking your eye dominance. I am left eye dominant but right handed. Once I switched to shooting my accuracy improved for sure. I was always 3-4 inches off my “spot”. Now I know if I miss it’s my concentration/release/follow through. Check it out, may be your problem. Good luck and stick with it!

-Jeremy

[Arne Moe]

#39559

madmav70 wrote: I have tried changing the spine, adjusting the nock, and even drawing the string to the left to counter-act it, with no luck.

At this stage for you I would suggest that you look to your shooting form rather than trying to fix equipment. This is sort of the exact opposite of how C bows are set up and takes a different mind set. For many who are just starting out, there is a tendency to draw too far back which as the string hand/nock move back on the face, places the nock of the arrow to the right and not under your eye.

Try shooting with the string in front of your eye, it should essentially center your pupil. If you perceive the string to be to the right, the arrows will go left every time. Try shooting a few arrows with the string in front of your eye, try to keep your string hand on your face at release (let it move to the rear but maintain contact on your cheek) and see what happens.

Arne

[trl242]

#39633

Could be any number of things. Make sure you concentrate more on using proper back tension as opposed to where the arrows go. I can only describe how I shoot, or try to, to give you an example. As I draw the bow using my back muscles and I get to full draw, I have a different amount of tension in each muscle due to the different position of each arm. One hand is at my face and the bow hand is in front of me. This gives me the feeling that there is more tension in my drawing muscle (whether that’s the case or not). When I release the arrow, I simply make myself aware of this right hand back tension and the string slips from my fingers. If I, instead, make myself aware of the tension in both muscles at release time, my bow arm tends to flail left and sends my arrow left. Thinking only about my right shoulder tension allows me to keep my bow hand steady and my release much more consistent.

Ultimately, you will have to experiment and find what works best for you. The best advice I ever received was while watching a Larry Yien video where he talks about finding a second anchor point, the one in your back. Recurves are net very forgiving as opposed to longbows though and usually when you’ve eliminated everything else it all comes back to form.

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