Comm Games results

Well it has been a while since I last posted here.... the Commonwealth Games has come and gone and unfortunately I did not come home with a medal. We got very close to a medal in the team event as we finished 4th. We did manage on our way to the semi finals to set a new Australian Tournament Record and Comm Games Record of 234 out of 240. The old Australian record was 233.

I finished equal 9th in the individual event.

Congrats to the Australian Recurve Mens Team as they won the GOLD and congrats to Cassie for taking the BRONZE in the Compound Ladies event

COMMONWEALTH GAMES... HERE I COME

I am happy to advise that I have made the Commonwealth Games Team to compete in India during October.

For preparation, I will now be competing at World Cup #4 in China which starts the first week of September. The team will also come together a week before Comm Games up in Darwin for a training camp.

50MTR TRAINING - 352

Went to the club this evening to get the bow all set for 50 meters in preparation for World Cup #3 in Ogden(USA) where will once again be trying out the new compound 50mtr round and the hit/miss system.

Practice went well and the bow is feeling great.... happy with it all at this stage.

I shot 59-59-59-58-58-59 = 352

NAMED IN COMM GAMES TOP 4 MENS COMPOUND SQUAD

Received the email today naming me in the next stage for selection into the Comm Games Team.

Now I head to Canberra for a camp before the entire squad goes to the USA for World Cup #3 from which they will select the top 3 shooters from each division to compete at the Commonwealth Games.

There are 4 parts to the next selection... each part will have each archer ranked 1 to 4, so at the end of the 4 part selection the 3 archers with the lowest points totals will be selected for the Comm Games.

This will be exciting, looking forward to it.

COMM GAMES TRIAL - AIS CANBERRA 02-04 JULY

This trial was the second part of stage two in the selection process. The selectors will now make their judgements as to who will proceed to the next stage by selecting the top 4 from the top 5 that attended camps #1 and #2.... archers will be notified on wednesday 6th July

Before camp #2, I had spent the last two weeks working on my structure changes from camp #1... even though this change had improved my shooting, I was still getting body movement as if too much tension was running through my muscles. For camp #2, Jim Park had offered to take some photos so I could get a better understanding of how things looked from different angles... it was one of these angles that showed that my draw arm elbow was situated behind the line of the arrow. This was saying that the draw length was a fraction long (on the release end, not the bows draw length).... so from this, I reduced the length of the d-loop from 18mm to 10.5mm but when Jim had looked once again it was still showing my elbow being slightly behind the arrow line. Now going back 8 years, my elbow was slightly in front on the arrow line... the only difference from then to now was that back then I was shooting with the release aid(Carter Atension-4 finger) up in the webbing past the second knuckle and now I was shooting the release between the 1st and 2nd knuckles. The reason I changed was that I started shooting a different model release aid(Scott-4 finger and 2 finger) and I could not shoot that model up in the webbing as it would dig into the side of my finger causing a lot of discomfort and eventually blood. Now however since going back to the Carter Atension(2 finger) at the start of the year I had kept the positioning between 1st and 2nd knuckles as I was using with the other model...... anyways, after Jim saying I was still slightly behind, I made the change back to holding the Atension up near the webbing and straight away I noticed less tension through my muscles and my aiming had improved.
The only thing now I have to work on is the refining of the release timing as by changing the holding position in the hand has changed the head position of the release and made it a fraction too long to activate the shot.....

Its all very exciting and it is great being able to hold steady once again..... hopefully big scores will follow

70MTR PRACTICE

Took some time today to continue working on my form change while shooting at 70 meters... all went pretty well and the change is starting to feel more natural. I scored 117-117-117-118... pretty happy with the consistency but still think things can improve.

COMM GAMES TRIAL - AIS CANBERRA 18-20 JUNE

Headed up to Canberra for the next stage in team selection for the Commonwealth Games.

All scores below were shot at 70mtrs

Day1(Friday) we all took part in a 36 arrow ranking round and I ranked 2nd with 346, I then had a shoot off with 1st place and lost the match with a 108.... condition were very cold but it was good experience with the conditions.

Day2(Saturday) We had 3 ranking rounds followed by match practice.
Each ranking round was 3 ends of 6 arrows and I scored 171-171-175(perfect score being 180)
The matches that followed each ranking were all slightly different it started with 3 arrow matches, then 6 arrow matches and finally 1 arrow matches... this simulated the set structure shot at World Cups and for the Comm Games.
My 3 arrow scores were 29-29-29-30-29-30(perfect score being 30)
My 6 arrow scores were 59-59-59(perfect score being 60)
My 1 arrow scores were 10-10-10-9-10-10(perfect score being 10)

Day3(Sunday) We had a fun day competing in a multi mixed team event with each team having a mens and ladies recurve and a mens and ladies compound. We shot two competitions and for each competition each team member shot 18 arrows ranking to form a qualification score. The teams I participated in both went through to the bronze medal match where each member shot 4 ends of 1 arrow each member.
For my rankings I shot 172 and 173(perfect score being 180)
For my match arrows I shot 39-39-39(perfect score being 40)

At the end of the day while the recurvers were having a tuning session, I decided to shoot and score 36 while working of my technique/structure changes and I scored 355(60-60-60-58-58-59)

Next camp in 2 weeks and then they will name the top 4 shooters for each division