Shooting a recurve bow takes many years of honing your skill, to the point of obsession. High level recurve archers practice as many times as 6 days per week when they are “in season”. Not everyone has that luxury, and nobody has perfect form (yes, including top-level archers), so here are some common form mistakes that cause your arrows to land in places other than the middle—or in the average—of your group. Please note that these form corrections will mainly be described for a right-handed archer, and left-handed archers will need to change the left-right wording. Problems that result in arrows that land with a vertical variation will remain the same for right- and left-handed archers.
Arrows hitting left of the group
Errant arrows that are hitting the target to the left are one of the most common mistakes for a right-handed recurve archer. Generally, this is caused by tense bow hand, collapsing bow arm, and/or plucking the string.
Tense bow hand: Keeping a nice and relaxed bow hand will induce less torque into your grip and allow your bow to pull into your hand. Torque puts sideways pressure on your bow, which causes the arrows to go left. Relaxing your bow hand rather than trying to tense it the same way every time will result in more consistency.
Collapsing bow arm: Not to be confused with a dropping bow arm, a collapsing bow arm drifts right and ends up in front of the archer instead of continuing to point at the target. This can cause arrows to hit left due to lack of proper follow-through, resulting in a weak shot.
Plucking the string: When an archer’s release hand comes off the face while executing the shot, the back side of the arrow is pulled away from the face, causing the arrow to point to the left. Keep your release hand tight against your face.
Arrows hitting to the right of the group
Arrows to the right are not as common to a right-handed archer as the previous problem, but two issues that can cause this are unbalanced front-to-back force upon release and bowhand torque.
When you have too much force off the bowstring upon release – also considered as forcing the shot – it’s possible to give the arrow more “umph” than normal. Due to this extra energy received by the arrow from the bow string, the arrow will behave weaker than the other arrows, thus sending it to the right (right arrows in bare-shaft tuning indicate a weak arrow spine). Keep your release relaxed and natural without forcing the follow-through.
Arrows hitting high or low
Generally, arrows that have vertical variation are the result of one or more of the following problems: dropping bow arm, inconsistent grip pressure, and inconsistent finger pressure on the bow string.
Dropping bow arm: After the arrow has left the bow, it’s good practice to keep your bow arm up until the arrow has hit the target. This allows the arrow to travel as straight as possible to the target without the effects from the entire bow dropping – a bow that is falling while the arrow is leaving the bow will cause the arrow to hit high or low, depending on when the bow drop has happened.
Inconsistent grip pressure: Consistently placing your bow hand into the grip is critical, especially since this is one of two contact points you have with your bow. Whether you have a low pressure point (near the heel of your palm) or a high pressure point (near the webbing of your thumb) changing your pressure from shot to shot will affect your vertical arrow impacts. Pick one and stick with it.
Finger pressure on the string: This relationship is quite simple, and you can test it for yourself; more finger pressure above the arrow will send it high, and more pressure below will send the arrow low. Make sure to hook the string with finger pressure that you can replicate from shot to shot. The most common practice is to have most of the weight on your index and middle fingers, with the ring finger taking about 10-20% of the draw weight. However, this can vary with different shooting styles.
A well-tuned bow will make these indicators even easier to spot, and a certified coach can help refine your technique further. But even on your own, these tips give you a practical foundation for understanding and correcting inconsistent shot placement.
