archery story

by bj , Saturday, November 26, 2016, 21:57 (2857 days ago) @ Bryan

I'm a member of a local private range, years before I joined their range was next to an archery range. At some point in time someone challenged someone else to an informal contest. After the contest a couple of the pistol guys were at their car in the parking lot talking about how they didn't know that the archery guys were that good, when a couple of the archery guys walked by talking among themselves and the pistol shooters overheard them saying that they didn't have any idea that the pistol shooters were that good.

Since I've had experience in both, I believe that a good archer using olympic style equipment is closely matched with a good shooter shooting offhand with a good handgun. Back when I shot a lot of arrows and was pretty good, I've shot in indoor tournaments where I put 60 arrows in a 3" circle at 20 yards. I've seen people with compounds who could keep 60 shots in 1.5" circle at 20 yards. It takes a real good handgun to do that out of a machine rest, much less being held and aimed by a human.

In college and out of college I did a lot of archery, but it took a lot of time too and I eventually got away from it. I can not shoot a handgun for awhile and still do well with it but if I didn't shoot a bow for awhile then I couldn't hit anything. It would take a lot of practice to get to the point where I could click and start shooting well.