BiG Boar
05-20-2015, 07:47 AM
The shoot was a lot of fun, I will definitely be back next year. This only was my 3rd traditional 3D shoot. First day started out pretty easy I thought, I shot well on the 0 (miss),5 (body),10 (lungs) scoring system and ended up with 325 out of a possible 420 (long shot on an elk for bonus, and a steel turkey for a bonus 10 also, which I didn't take). I found my biggest failure was practicing too far away. I had never practiced and shot a less than 20 yards and many of the targets below 20 were very small, so I found gapping them was hard.
The next day I started to over think things and I took too long holding my shot. Especially on the longer shots. This caused me to think that I was relaxing my draw and pull it a bit extra. This caused me 7 clean misses, all over the back of the animal. The targets were farther and at a lot steeper of side angles than the first day. Also, there were many shots behind brush. I learned here that the angles on the kill zone then also changed from what you perceived. Though there were no rules posted, which I found annoying, we were not permitted to use binoculars, though some people were using them. This made knowing where the kill zone is very tough for a new shooter. If you know where to shoot, it helps, as many of the targets are not where I would think the kill zone is. The guy who pushed me out of the rankings was using binoculars for the first few shots, it turned out. (he didn't know either) The second day, I shot a 280 out of 420. This toughening of course happened to most shooters.
The last day of the shoot was very close to the second day, the angles were all changed again and a few of the animals were put behind trees, the distances extended it bit more. Also, the top shooters in each category were flighted together. This is done to prevent guys who are not so honest in their scoring I'm guessing. It was interesting to watch the guy who was in first place both days, shooting 81% accuracy in my category seemingly "fall apart" to a 62% average. Not saying you can't have a bad day once in a while, but it does make a guy wonder. I ended up shooting 270 out of 340 this day. I had a few arrows left, so I tried for the steel turkey. I missed. Going into the day I was 5 points behind second place and 75 behind first place. With Kim Wong 15 points behind me. The top 5 of us were put in the group together. I learned a lot watching the best shoot. Shooting styles were different, with my high nose anchor, and looking on the wrong side of the string, being the strangest. I ended up missing 4 shots this round, which was better than yesterdays 7 zeros. Greybark gave me some good advice of being aggressive on the longer shots, and not over thinking them. This did work. I feel it was my best round, even though it was my lowest score. It was the hardest round to shoot. Kim Wong ended up showing us what a true champion is made of and shot a 335, moving from 4th to 2nd place. He also almost caught the leader he was behind, by 15 points. I ended up 10 points behind 3rd place to take 4th. I felt good enough about 4th place of 30 guys, as I am new shooter.
Next time I would bring more arrows as breakage does happen on these rocky courses, my first time tournament friend ended up leaving with 6 of his 12 new wood arrows. I brought 7 arrows and left with 4. I would bring crappy old arrows for the steel targets. I would also bring my flu flu arrows. They shot bow birds one evening as a group, but I didn't have any to shoot, even though I have a dozen at home. That being said, my fingers were also growing sore. One thing I would like to see next year is a bows for sale corner. With so many traditional shooters in one place, it would be great to try out different style bows and be great to have a place to try and sell the longbow that doesn't work with my shooting style.
With 101 registered shooters, the pot luck pig roast was incredible. Enjoyed by all of us. I look forward to it again next year. I was looking forward to oyster fest this year, in fact this was a selling feature for why I wanted to come, (I love oysters) but for some reason this didn't happen this year. Hopefully that will continue next year. On the raffle I won a target donated by Vantage Point Outfitters. Thanks to all the people who donated, there were a lot of great prizes. Overall, it was a fun course, and the organizers did a great job of setting it up. The whole event was a lot of fun, including some of the shooting challenges that came each afternoon. I met lots of great people to talk hunting with, including some from this site, and met some great shooters also. I am already planning on making some changes and seeing how much more I can improve for next year. Thank you to all of put this on, you did a wonderful job, I am looking forward to next year already!
The next day I started to over think things and I took too long holding my shot. Especially on the longer shots. This caused me to think that I was relaxing my draw and pull it a bit extra. This caused me 7 clean misses, all over the back of the animal. The targets were farther and at a lot steeper of side angles than the first day. Also, there were many shots behind brush. I learned here that the angles on the kill zone then also changed from what you perceived. Though there were no rules posted, which I found annoying, we were not permitted to use binoculars, though some people were using them. This made knowing where the kill zone is very tough for a new shooter. If you know where to shoot, it helps, as many of the targets are not where I would think the kill zone is. The guy who pushed me out of the rankings was using binoculars for the first few shots, it turned out. (he didn't know either) The second day, I shot a 280 out of 420. This toughening of course happened to most shooters.
The last day of the shoot was very close to the second day, the angles were all changed again and a few of the animals were put behind trees, the distances extended it bit more. Also, the top shooters in each category were flighted together. This is done to prevent guys who are not so honest in their scoring I'm guessing. It was interesting to watch the guy who was in first place both days, shooting 81% accuracy in my category seemingly "fall apart" to a 62% average. Not saying you can't have a bad day once in a while, but it does make a guy wonder. I ended up shooting 270 out of 340 this day. I had a few arrows left, so I tried for the steel turkey. I missed. Going into the day I was 5 points behind second place and 75 behind first place. With Kim Wong 15 points behind me. The top 5 of us were put in the group together. I learned a lot watching the best shoot. Shooting styles were different, with my high nose anchor, and looking on the wrong side of the string, being the strangest. I ended up missing 4 shots this round, which was better than yesterdays 7 zeros. Greybark gave me some good advice of being aggressive on the longer shots, and not over thinking them. This did work. I feel it was my best round, even though it was my lowest score. It was the hardest round to shoot. Kim Wong ended up showing us what a true champion is made of and shot a 335, moving from 4th to 2nd place. He also almost caught the leader he was behind, by 15 points. I ended up 10 points behind 3rd place to take 4th. I felt good enough about 4th place of 30 guys, as I am new shooter.
Next time I would bring more arrows as breakage does happen on these rocky courses, my first time tournament friend ended up leaving with 6 of his 12 new wood arrows. I brought 7 arrows and left with 4. I would bring crappy old arrows for the steel targets. I would also bring my flu flu arrows. They shot bow birds one evening as a group, but I didn't have any to shoot, even though I have a dozen at home. That being said, my fingers were also growing sore. One thing I would like to see next year is a bows for sale corner. With so many traditional shooters in one place, it would be great to try out different style bows and be great to have a place to try and sell the longbow that doesn't work with my shooting style.
With 101 registered shooters, the pot luck pig roast was incredible. Enjoyed by all of us. I look forward to it again next year. I was looking forward to oyster fest this year, in fact this was a selling feature for why I wanted to come, (I love oysters) but for some reason this didn't happen this year. Hopefully that will continue next year. On the raffle I won a target donated by Vantage Point Outfitters. Thanks to all the people who donated, there were a lot of great prizes. Overall, it was a fun course, and the organizers did a great job of setting it up. The whole event was a lot of fun, including some of the shooting challenges that came each afternoon. I met lots of great people to talk hunting with, including some from this site, and met some great shooters also. I am already planning on making some changes and seeing how much more I can improve for next year. Thank you to all of put this on, you did a wonderful job, I am looking forward to next year already!