Hey there, first post here, I've browsed the forum quite a bit and you all seem pretty helpful. I've been shooting 3-4 times a week for the last couple months in preparation for deer season and I'm still not as consistent as I would like to be at this time of year. I'm feeling pretty good at 30 yds and in but after that it all falls apart. I have noticed that within the last month or more I cannot for the life of me get the correct pin back up to my target once it has dropped past my spot, basically I'm freezing my pin. Obviously the further I step back away from the target the worse it is. I'll give you an example, let's say I'm shooting out att 40 yds, I will come to full draw with my 40 yd pin floating over the intended point of impact but as soon as the pin floats just low of where I want it, I freeze up and can not get the pin back to where I would like it. I can move it slightly upward but cannot bring it all the way without some kind of flinch. Anyway, sorry for the long rant here but I hate this and I can't let it go on anymore. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Practice , practice , practice ! I've never had the freezing problem , but lots and lots of practice should help. Also , what size are your pins ? I found that I absolutely cannot stand .029" pins. They are WAY to big for me , even up close at 20yds. I like a .019" pin , you can see a lot better what you're aiming at. I have to get a new sight before the season comes in down here (broke my main , and my back-up is a 3 pin in .029") ... I'm going to try to customize my cluster and go with 3 .019" for 20, 30, 40 , and 2 .010" for 50 and 60. Not sure how that'll work , but I hope it's good. Me personally , shooting .029" pins , my groups are fine at 20 and 30 , but start to spread at 40. If I'm shooting .019" pins , I can hold a tight group out to 50 , and a 3 or 4 inch group at 60. Hope this helps , other than the pin size , just practice. If you're having problems flinching , I would get close to your Target , draw , aim , and close your eyes , and practice nothing but a good release and follow through.
I think your arm is just getting tired. You're not used to raising your arm up that high and you're having trouble getting past that sticky point. Get yourself a dumbbell that's a little heavier and do some raises with it. Something like this http://youtu.be/mdnZzQT1BXo. Instead of letting the palm of your hand face the ground, hold it out like you would with your bow grip. Use a light weight and do about 20 slow reps in the morning when you get up and before you go to bed at night. Eventually, you'll notice a lot more control over your sight picture.
That's a great idea , bigstick , I'll have to try that myself. Maybe my arm won't get fatigued as quick.
Sounds like you may have a case of target panic. Some people recommend coming onto the target from a different direction. I.E. If you normally come onto the target from the top, try the bottom or maybe even from the sides. Or this may be more helpful. Nock an arrow and come to full draw with no intentions of shooting. Just aim at the spot and see what it feels like to get your pin to float. Let down. Practice this and it may just go away. I really haven't had your sort of target panic. My problem was punching the trigger. I had it so bad one time that I would punch my trigger before even getting on the target. I could draw my bow back and tell myself NOT to shoot and I would still punch the trigger. Kinda scary that I couldn't even make myself not pull the trigger. One thing that helped me was to clip my release on the d-loop and tape the release jaws shut. When I got to full draw I was punching like crazy but my release could not go off. It helped me a lot! Take this seriously. I have wounded more deer than I care to admit because of target panic.
Thanks guys for the comments. BigStick, you may have the answer there. I shattered my upper left arm a few years ago and it's never been that strong since. Then coincedentally, this year I broke my ankle and was unable to do much shooting for a couple months earlier this year. I feel like I've been practicing quite regularly but have the same problem nearly everytime I get out past 30 yds. I just had a new Spot Hogg sight put on this year and the top (20 and 30) are .029 and the bottom 3 are .019. Finch, I've been trying to draw back and make sure my pin comes down to my spot but maybe I should shoot at 15 yds and just draw below my spot and force myself to bring the pin up. Either way, thanks a lot to the 3 of you guys, you've given me something to work with and I think I can fix this.
I tend to side with Finch here. Sounds like you have a case of target panic. Its not hard at all to obtain, but can be a bear to correct. TP comes in all shapes and sizes too. Some punch the trigger once the pin hits the bullseye, others freeze and have a hard time pulling the shot off. Others can't keep the pin on the target, etc. The first thing you need to realize is its ALL mental. Archery is not a physical sport really. Sure you're pulling and holding weight, but 99% of archery is mental. I had something like what you described happen to me a couple years back. I would hold just above the bullseye and for the life of me, couldn't keep the pin down. I fought with it a while and finally, just put the bow down and didn't shoot for a couple weeks. Went back to shooting and it was still there, but not quite as bad. I finally found my answer and it corrected it though. Here is what I did and would suggest to you. Go out to shoot as normal. Nock an arrow and draw the bow back and get everything lined up like you're going to shoot. But DO NOT shoot the arrow. Hold that pin on the bullseye and count to 10. Let down on the bow. Repeat this 10 times and then shoot one arrow. Repeat the whole process again. I did this for a month or so and it helped me tremendously. Another thing you can try is blind bale shooting every so often as well.
I'm with muzzyman and Finch on this one - sounds like a pretty classic case of target panic. I had the same issue a few years back and it was a PITA to get rid of. I ended up doing the same thing as muzzyman with drawing back, aiming, and letting down. I also spent a considerable amount of time blind shooting into a target at close range. Basically drawing back, closing my eyes, and focusing on the mechanics of the shot versus where I was aiming. Over time it went away and luckily it hasn't come back. I do still punch the trigger on a rare occassion, but immediately after doing so I will take a break for several minutes before my next shot, and then take an excessively long amount of time at full draw before hitting the trigger again. Often times I won't even put my trigger on the finger until I've been at full draw for close to a minute.
These guys are right. My GF got the exact same target panic (there are many different symptoms). It's a mind thing that you have to get over. Learning to shoot with a back tension release will help greatly, if you do it correctly. This form of release also works with hunting releases. It will be some work as it won't go away over night. Good luck.
Wow, with everyone responding with a lean towards TP, I wonder if I read the situation wrong. The way I saw it, he was just getting tired and losing a little bit of his small motor control. I've had it happen when shooting rifle as well. Arms start getting tired and the rifle gets harder to hold up and all of a sudden it gets difficult to raise the sight to the right level. Not that I couldn't but, that fine control was gone. JustinM1887, try starting your shooting at 40 yards and see if that changes things up for you a little bit. If the problem still persists I'll agree that it's mental. If it's just that your tired when you go to shoot at 40, you should have a lot more control over where your sight pin hovers.
This is exactly why I posted on here, I knew you guys would come up with many suggestions. I definitely see where you were headed with your ideas Bigstick and it definitely has merit. I do think it's a form of target panic and I cringe as I type that phrase. I like the idea of pulling back and actually going through the shot sequence without actually shooting. Yesterday, as I was shooting, I kept everything within 30 yds and noticed that my first arrow in a set was really pretty good and I could get my pin to cooperate a bit more, as soon as I nocked my 2nd arrow, the s**t hit the fan! Guys, thanks for the advice, I'm pretty sure it's a mental thing, no surprise when you've got my kind of worrying mind behind the wheel here. Oh, one more thing, I'm shooting a rinehart block and when I get out to 40 yds or more that thing starts looking pretty small. I've definitely put some arrows underneath the thing due to this problem. Do you think that the smaller target I'm shooting at could cause some of this? I'm actually getting a rinehart broadhead buck in the next few days, hoping this gives me a little more long distance confidence.
Guess it could be part of the problem. Are your longer yardage pins (40 & 50) smaller in diameter than your 20 & 30 yard pins? I use smaller pins for longer yardages so the pin doesn't cover the target. Remember though, "aim small & miss small." I used to love shooting my bow everyday for a couple hours on end. I think that is one reason I developed TP. Shooting too much can be detrimental. Now I concentrate on quality, not quantity. Don't practice bad habits. Take the advice everyone has given and get this fixed before season starts. Good luck!
BigStick, you may be correct as well. There are lots of things that come in to play with questions like this. Having lots of opinions for the OP is great and we all learn from each other. Keep on posting bud! JustinM1887, don't sweat the target panic. I assume you're fairly new to archery. I highly doubt that anyone on this board has ever not gotten a form of TP at one point or another. If you shoot long enough, it will happen it seems. I've also noticed this with guys who were never shown how to properly execute a shot from the beginning. Most guys, IMO, including myself when I was younger, assumed that to shoot a trigger release meant to slowly squeeze it off, like a rifle. This works fine for a while, but eventually, IMO, TP will creep into the picture. Why? Because you're not shooting with enough back tension in your shot. To the OP, do some research on back tension shooting. I believe you'll quickly see that you are doing some things incorrectly. I know I did when I first started reading into it. Since I've begun using back tension in my shot, even with a hunting release, I have been far more consistent, tire less and haven't had TP issues. Back tension is usually referred to with a triggerless release, but it can be done in a modified way with a normal wrist style hunting release. If you try it, be patient with it and keep at it. It will be frustrating at first but once you get that "feel" for it, you'll be off and running and on your way to TPless land. I still think doing what Justin and I suggested first would be a great way to start getting things under control. The "no shot" routine and the blind shooting should help tremendously. One other thing. If you start doing these things. Don't stop once you feel your shooting better! I still, even though I haven't had TP creep back up, do these things about once a month. It helps keep my good habits engrained and bad habits away.
They did give very good advice. This is something that I suffer from on occassion too. Drawing, holding, and not firing works very well in this situation. Like muzzyman stated, its all mental!!! You would be amazed at how steady you could hold on target knowing that your not releasing the arrow. This technique will get you back to form rather quickly if you are dilligent about it. One other thing that helps me with this is that I try to put myself into a real hunting situation. I will draw and hold as if the deer is not offering a shot. I will draw and aim on a spot 10 yards away and slowly move the pin as if the deer was walking down a trail and into your shooting lane. Sometimes I will combine this with a mouth call as to stop the deer for the shot. I will do push ups and some sprints to simulate the adrenaline in you before the shot. I will also put the pin on the deer and then jerk it away at full draw and then come back to the target. This is for simulating the deer taking a short sprint from either being spooked or chasing a doe. When I do this it reminds me of the bow hunt or die episode when Justin killed Little Mac. He was slowly on him and then at the last second had to make a quick adjustment and executed a perfect shot. Bottom line is you never know what will happen and doing these things takes your mind off of what your doing form wise and puts you into a real situation where you are taking the shot based on what the deer is doing. Now before I catch hell, I know that form is VERY important, but sometimes I think you can get too wrapped up in it and it can negatively affect your shooting. I practice both ways and often times shoot better when I try to simulate and real hunting situation. This has helped me, along with the advice that was already given. I hope you get this all straightened out before the season comes along and remember that a very high percentage of us bow hunt because it is fun and we enjoy doing it. We don't make a living off it. So enjoy it and try not to let it frustrate you. Have fun!!!
Thanks, Indiana, I have attempted some practice where I was moving the pin in an attempt to simulate a moving deer. I definitely practiced this a bit back in the spring when preparing for turkey season. I've been doing some reading around the internet about this problem and I know that it's quite prevalent with shooters but I am encouraged because I don't feel that I have some of the drastic problems others have had. With that said, I can't let this head to far south, so I will take some of these suggestions and see what happens. I'm also wondering if my innacuracy could be contributed to the fact that my peep seems to small. I had a 4 pin sight with a small housing and then switched to a spot hogg right on-5 pin with a larger housing ring. I feel that I should've switched to a larger peep to accomodate the larger housing ring- going to my shop in the next few days gonna see what they have to say.
Indiana is right about form. But I think it can be referenced differently. Form is the building blocks of good archery. Without good form, you'll never be as consistent as you can be. However, I think where Indiana is coming from, its different. No way, will you always have that perfect shot situation where you can stand tall and proud, like an Olympic archer, showing perfect from on the shot. We're usually twisting, turning, bending, crouched behind a tree, all while standing on a little aluminum platform 20ft up a tree! I think it boils down to being able to have some semblance of good form while doing these things are what matters. To me, it still comes back to good form at the range. This is where you develop that "feel" for what your form should feel like. Once in a hunting situation, you can then easily recognize it when the time comes. You'll know something isn't right and be able to correct it or get closer to it being right. I know this is a little off topic, so my apologies to the OP.
I've been shooting for 30 years,and from what you are describing,it is both target panic and a strength issue.I dont know what poundage you are shooting ,but lowering your draw weight 8 or 10 lbs. might make you much more comfortable at full draw.you should be able to hold full draw for 1 minute without shaking .if you can't ,your pulling to much weight.it might surprise you how much your groups will shrink with just a few pounds less draw weight.your comfort at full draw is IMPERATIVE for you to shoot(kill)with consistency.don't listen to the speed junkies out there,if your your not accurate ,your going to wound animals.good luck and good hunting.
I have experienced the same problem. I ended up so frustrated I went away from bowhunting and competitive shooting to the point that I didn't even own a bow. Bought a new bow this last year and guess what...after 3 years of not shooting the target panic was still there!!!!! I can't get on the bull no matter what I do. I have been shooting through this issue though. After trying the method of drawing and lining up like I would shoot and then letting down after a 10 count, I have become almost back to normal. My groups are tightening up, and I am happy once again. But don't get frustrated. You have to shoot through this. And you have to be patient with the 10 second hold method. You will flinch and jump all around sometimes while holding. It's a mind thing. And it will drive you nuts! I also suggest if you are having this problem to practice with plenty of space behind you...because holding through that point where you want to shoot can cause you to punch and flinch and accidentally fire. Good luck and don't give up.
