Bow Hand
Your bow hand must be quite relaxed while on the draw cycle. Feel the trajectory developed by the draw hand acting on the loose bow hand.
Be aware during the draw cycle, the weight of the shaft, the immediate trajectory of the shaft, the power being drawn from the bow limbs, the speed of their cast, and focus and practice to control the bow in just the right way when the string is let go. The goal of archery is the result dynamic of the arrow based on a dance of extraordinary balance developed in my bow hand and between it and the draw hand.
If your shafts aren't flying true, address these before reading and understandingthe following: make sure that your shafts are not under spined, that there is not a crook in your shaft, that your fletch is not too a-symmetricaly damaged, is the wind strong that day, as that will exacerbate poor flight from the previous points mentioned.
More feathering will make up for poor bow hand control, at the cost of arrow impact energy.
Slow down, think about every shot and how your bow hand effects the arrow flight. Think about what your bow hand must feel like, your arm postion movement, the pressures in your fingers, pam, wrist, shoulder and bent arm to fire an arrow, true and STRAIGHT to the mark. Think about the power of resistance to effect the arrow.
During the shot you must accomplish two things: hit the mark, while making sure not the stave nore your hand will touch the arrow after the loose.
Your bow hand should be controlled, deliberate, and firm on the stave; not a vice grip but counter balancing in a controled way every moment of the cast cycle. The whole arm must adapt to the unique requirements of the accurate dynamic shot.
At draw, my bow hand complies, through feel, with the trajectory being chosen by my mind and draw hand.
Think about the draw power and pushing the arrow, strate, true, from the nock into a power flight to your target.
AFTER realeasing the string, a subtle, measured forward rotation force is usually added to the push forward to augment the power placed into the shaft; this is to say that as the arrow is exiting the bow, the bow hand can be moved down and put out of the way of the retreating fletching, whereas if it no rotation was added the bow hand would tend to follow the immediate vector of force and thus want to move up and into the precise center of the exiting shaft, catching your bow hand thumb on the fletch; this touque force will save your fletching from shearing on your shots. This force must balance with the horizontal movement of the exiting shaft and your arm movement down. Think - powering the knock and maintaining the arrow trajectory, into the target. Remember, this is a SUBTLE, MEASURED rotation.
In dynamic archery, where you hold the bow depends on your draw hand and trajectory. After loose, measured slight twist must be present- with a slight arm movement away from the exiting stave (coupled with the forward rotation mentioned earlier); this vector of force ensures your shaft clears the side of the stave; too little and you will strip feathers and your shaft will shoot untrue; too much, your shaft will also fly untrue.
I shoot a slavic draw, if you do the same, you add a SUBTLE, MEASURED pre tourqu. However, you run the risk of unstringing your bow and warping the brace position of the tips to string in a laminated horse bow, from my experience. Never pre twist torque a horse bow. A excess twist will put a stress on the laminations of the bow, and even more risky while the temperature are as warm as they are increasingly becoming. Be aware, pretouque will tend to put you on the path of fighting draw power, trying to use your wrist to move the arrow, where it is the limbs and arm push which must propell the arrow. Remember, THE LIMBS power the shaft, not your wrist or a twist tourque! The string is not a stick; they are loose ropes that only resist tension, not bending. Only add enough tourqe to move the stave out of the way, wich is not much at all. Always aim to keep the moving nock of the arrow through the cast cycle, true and straight.
The absolute key words are to feel-the-arrow - slow down. You have only between loose to brace to control the arrow; do this by feeling the weight of the wood shaft shot after shot to know how much and when to add a power flight into the stave.
Feel the required push to the shaft - the small spear - into the desired target. Ask yourself: How much power will it take to throw this arrow so and so distance at whatever angle.
Reduce arm swing after the shot to minimize the time it is ready to nock another arrow, the more time and energy, however slight it seems, will be wasted; this is a bad habit. Your bow hand push should be so efficient there is NO will to swing your bow arm after a shot.
You will always slighly push, with the aim of adaptation to a particular shot, the bow forward and control a straight arrow trajectory.
Keep your bow arm well bent when pulling the string to draw. There is far more adaptive control you will learn and then apply when the bow arm is bent.
Remember however, the push is subtle and efficiency focusing. You want to transfer the power had from the full drawn limbs to the nock with a deliberate push of the stave. If you feel you need to actually push your arrow however, your bow is not strong enough. Push the power of the limbs into the well aimed shaft to reach the target you should focus on.
Make sure the shaft stays straight while the string is touching it.
Your stave guard should have minimal wear. If your feathers are chewing through it every practice, your shot produce a slap, smack, crack sound, you are not moving the stave out of the way as the arrow leaves the bow. You are nether holding the stave firmly enough, nore doing the rotation described above well enough.
The only time the arrow should make contact at two points on the shaft is when knocking until the moment of release. After that, while the arrow is being cast from the bow, it should only be in contact with the strings power point - no shelf, hand, or finger.
USE hand protection, but don't need it or depend on it. Injury to the bow hand, as a beginner, is inevitable - find out where the shaft tend to strike your hand and cover it; however, the shafts should not be repeatedly touching your bow hand such that they will injure it; this indicates inefficiency in cast and your technique is wrong. When starting in dynamic adaptive archery, injury can subconsciously send you down a path of exageration and poor technique in attempting to avoid repeat injury (like swings and short draws); avoid this and use protection.
The paramount goal to maintain regarding your bow hand is to make sure it casts the power point in perfect follow to the line of your arrow.
