a few good days of shooting

[Agincourtwarb0w]

Jake,
There are a number of tweaks that you could do to add distance to your shooting but you and Noel look like you have all the raw material there.  Firstly, you are not consistently achieving a 45 degree shot and Noel is shooting very.  This is easy to sort out and you are doing the right thing videoing your technique.  What I thought I was doing and what I was doing were 2 different things the first time I saw a video of myself.   Secondly, by the way you are holding the string you may not be getting a clean loose.  Do your arrows waggle a lot when they leave the bow?  This adds serious drag.
Mike has a good point about holding at full draw but you are right actions speak louder than theory.  His is an actual example.  At the recent EWBS shoot a 140lb heat-treated ash bow made by Jaroslav Petrina was shot with the technique where there is a hold at full-draw.  I think it’s fair to say that any bow made by him will be excellent.  It’s also fair to say that the archer who shot it has a lovely clean loose and always nails his angles at full draw.  His arrows will be well made excellent too.  Juxtapose this distance, shot in good conditions, of 199 yards with that achieved by Al Aston at the recent Warbow Wales shoot with a non-heat treated Welsh ash bow of 223 yards.  Al’s bow was 12lbs lighter and the arrows were commensurate, the Warbow Wales Mary Rose arrow being slightly heavier.  The only other difference was the fact that that Al shot with a hemp string but that would not give you a performance advantage over fastflite, obviously.  The results are here...
http://warbowwales.com/#/st-davids-day-shoot-2012/4561759550
I think the difference in performance is due to the hold at full-draw that wastes energy through hysteresis.  This is all the more apparent in woods like ash and hickory that has high hysteresis in the humid UK.  It’s not as apparent with yew and with the rolling loose you are adding a certain amount of arrow speed through body movement, maybe up to 3 fps.  However, I doubt it’s going to make up for it with white woods.
It will also be kinder to your bows not to hold at full draw as this means less strain on the bow.  If anyone has access to a shooting rig and a chrono then it would be interesting to see the fps difference in a 2 -3 second hold.
Keep up the good work; it's a nice vid too.

Jeremy

Hi there Jeremy!
Thank you very much for all that information! It is very much appreciated. Those most definitely are great results! When posted on the EWBS I got some similar feed back (Ian especially has given me much aid) about that I hold too long. I have heard that from beginning of draw to end should be about 3 seconds so I have tailored my technique to fit that. I also am now trying to (slowly and safely) be on top of a new 122lb Italian yew while not loosing my form. I wish I did have access to a shooting rig, but do not, I have been going solely on distances. (There are not too many of us warbow Canuckers !)
Nope, I rarely ever do I see my arrows wobble in flight, may I ask what you mean by how I hold the string? I have been working on pulling a little more on release so my fingers come back instead of around. Is this what you mean?
Well thanks mate I do appreciate your advice, I will also work on those angles! Hopefully soon I will post another video, and a change for the good will be seen!
Again, many thanks!
-Jake

[Ian.]

I think its the pull to the right every time you release Jake, (correct me if I'm wrong Jeremy) it wont allow the arrow to leave the bow smooth, any drag here will reduce the distance.  Have you read Toxophilus, and the Art of Archery both books contain very good information on how you should shoot a bow. Namely holding the string on the 2nd groove of the first finger, middle of the middle finger, and the last groove of the ring finger. That puts your arm in a position where you can draw and release better.

[Yeomanbowman]

Thanks Ian, that's what I was going to say.  A lot of people find a tab better too but Al uses a glove that has gone really hard at the finger tips and his distances are unsurpassed with war arrows.

[Agincourtwarb0w]

Interesting,no though I have heard much of it, I have not read it though I obviously should! I have always shot with a tab, using the third joint (from the hand) and never had trouble with me finger tips, I have never heard of one on each joint. Cheers both,

[fishfinder401]

i have also never heard of holding it on different places, i usually jsut use my second joint on my fingers, ill have to try that though, and i found out the other day that my full draw is actually 33 inches which really surprised me, but unfortunately this extra drawlength gave my hickory bow a little more set and it dropped some weight , i did some heat treating when i first made it, but would it be worth it to do some more heat treating to bring it back to its original weight?
thanks
noel

[soy]

Fishy, i thknk this is the second time venturing over here and im glad i did, what a cool video! Keep up the good work