Traditional Archery Longbow Shooting Tips

What's up guys, thank you for joining me today. On Instinctive Addiction Archery, I'm your host Jeff Phillips. I hope and pray, man, as always, you get something good out of this video. You might say, well what in the world are you up to today and what is this one going to be about? What do you think, man? Longbows, longbows. Now you might shoot both, like I do, recurves and longbows. You may just now be coming over to traditional archery from shooting compounds, crossbows, rifles, whatever, and you may just now be kind of getting into it. Well, I want to share some things with you guys that I have learned that have really, really helped me with longbows in particular. No matter what brand you have, who makes it, whatever, whether it's a hill style, whether it's a reflex deflex like this old battle bow that I have, there are a multitude of them out there. It really doesn't matter which one you have. It's all the same principles when you're shooting longbows. Now, whether you are aiming gap shooting, whether you're split vision shooting, whether you're trying to shoot pure instinctive, whichever, it really doesn't matter. I'm going to share something with you that I hope will help. You say, what in the world is it? All right, how much do you can't the bow? What do you mean by can't? I mean leaning the bow over when you shoot. How much do you need to can't a bow over? Well, I'm going to tell you some benefits of putting a little more can't to a longbow than you typically would a recurve. It's the way they're designed. Guys, I've shared in previous videos, there is a thing called a sight picture window. You have a sight picture window, and that's why these shelves are cut out like they are, because you have a sight picture. When you come to full draw and you're looking at the spot on your target, your peripheral vision is picking up the position of your arrow, your bow arm, your fist, everything. It's called your sight picture. You have to learn to trust that sight picture. If you are going to reference your arrow in any kind of way whatsoever, which is a big aid, it truly is. It really helps. You need to can't the bow a little bit, and I'll tell you what else it does. It helps you pull through your shot even better. Now, I'm not saying go too far, but I'm going to demonstrate a little bit of what I typically do, what works for me, what gives me the best sight picture window where I can see the little spot that I'm wanting to shoot, yet at the same time let my peripheral vision work, develop a sight picture that says your own, your own, your own. There it is. That's it. Your mind will tell you. That's the instinctive part of it, guys, is your mind tells you when the shot is right and when it's not. I've kind of mentioned in other videos, I shoot by feel. That's right. I shoot by feel. I don't hold the bow long. As you can tell, I don't hold long. There's just no need for me to do that. I can, but I just choose not to because as soon as I acquire a sight picture that I'm trusting, I'm pulling through that shot. I'm pulling the tension on the string and it just rolls off my fingers. It's gone. It's done. As long as I don't collapse, collapse my shoulder, collapse my arm, whatever, that arrow is going to go exactly where I'm looking. There's no doubt about it. Whether it's in the woods, in the field, at different distances, it does not make any difference. I'm going to demonstrate a little bit of canting the bow and opening up a sight picture window. And if you guys still don't understand what I mean about a sight picture window, let's just pretend you are the target and I'm looking at you going to shoot you. I'm going to draw the bow and you're going to see kind of how my head is tilted, how my bow is tilted over and what we call a cant, and how I am lining up everything looking where I want this arrow to go. And if this arrow was coming straight to you, this is what it would look like from a little bit of distance back, guys. It would look like this. I would line up, I'd hook my string, come into anchor, and I would be looking at you right there. That is a sight picture window. I'm looking right at what I want to shoot. All right, so let's turn around and let's do it on a target and show you guys what I mean. Pick the spot. Pick the spot that you want to shoot. That's the first thing. First thing you do, don't think about your form, don't think about your grip, don't think about anything but where you want that arrow to go. Remember, we don't have sights. What are our sights in traditional archery? Our sights in traditional archery is this little picture window that we have looking at a target and letting our peripheral vision see where we have the bow arm placed, the path of the arrow, everything. It's called a sight picture. That's all we have. We have to trust it. And when you figure out what works for you, maybe not me, but for you, and you learn what hits and what don't hit, then you learn to trust it. You recognize the perfect sight picture at any distance, and that is the elevation of the bow, right and left, everything. You have to trust it. Pick your spot, just like that. How do you make a perfect shot without sights? You learn to trust a sight picture. A sight picture. They're touching, look at that, like absolutely perfect. And all I'm saying is, guys, you can do it at any target, anywhere, it makes no difference if you learn to trust a sight picture. Now, if my sight picture, as I keep mentioning, were to be something that I wasn't ready for or confident, if I wasn't ready, if I come to full drop, my mind is going to tell me, uh-uh, uh-uh, you're not there. It's not on, it's not there. Whether you're aiming on with the arrow, whether you're focused on a spot, whether you're shooting pure instinctive, split vision, gap shooting, whatever, even if you're gap shooting, your mind tells you gap shooters trust their sight picture just like I do. No different. It is no different, because your mind will tell you when it is not right, when you're not ready to release that string, which means pulling through and letting it come off your fingers. You don't ever just release, guys, you don't do that. You don't, to explain it, as far as the release goes, a release needs to be a surprise, more or less a controlled surprise, if you will. It needs to be kind of explosive where it just comes off your fingers as you are putting tension on the string, okay? Because as you're putting tension, rolling the elbow around, using your back tension, it just happens. You get to a point when you have this expansion that it just happens. You don't just let go. It's called pulling through the shot. So while you're focused, while you're trusting the sight picture, while everything looks good and right, and you begin to pull through, it happens. And as long as you don't collapse, you can bet your arrow is going to go where it's supposed to go every single time. All right, I'm going to shoot it again. And what I'm going to do, since I have those two arrows, and I don't know if you guys can see them because I'm shooting black and chartreuse, so black and lime, they don't show up too good, but I like them. They're cool. And they match my bow. So I built them to match it. But what I'm going to do now, since I have two arrows right there, I'm going to focus. I'm going to focus on those two arrows. I'm going to try my best to bust a knock off one of those arrows. I don't really want to, but I want to at least get it touching. So that's number one. Focus on what you want. Come into your anchor, have the bow handed, have your sight picture looking good. You know when it's on at every distance just from practice. And it does come from practice, man. It does. Different distances. Let's say if I backed up 30 yards, it's all the same, but I'm going to elevate more. And I'm going to use that arrow. I'm going to know that it needs to be elevated for trajectory. And you do that through knowing your own equipment. Long distance works the same. You learn how to trust your sight picture, which means longer distance, you've got a little more elevation. When you count the bow over, it allows you to really tell where the arrow's at, where it needs to be, what you need to do while you're focused on your little spot. It all works together. Check this out. We're like 30 yards. 30 yards on the doe target with a lightweight longbow. 39 pounds. It cannot possibly be any better. That is a straight 12 ring if it ever was one. Bam. I'm talking right in the pocket, man. 30 yards. So can you do the same thing at any distance? Absolutely. It does not matter. How? How? Because, as I mentioned, guys, as I mentioned, your sight picture, elevation, how far you need to elevate, your mind will tell you through your equipment. When you learn your own equipment, and I'll give you an example. 39 pound old battle longbow. 400 grain arrow. That's right at 10 grains per pound that I'm shooting. I know the trajectory of this bow. I know what this bow does at 20, 25, 30, 35, 40 from shooting it. I know where my arrow drops. Therefore, I know exactly how far to elevate. I'm not staring at this. I'm not staring at that. I'm staring at the spot, but my peripheral vision clearly, clearly sees that arrow, clearly sees the bow hand, clearly sees everything, and it says, okay, that ought to do it. You shoot the shot, pull it through. That's it. Get all the energy your bow has. Don't give up anything because you can have the elevation right, and you can collapse, collapse this arm, collapse this arm, give up some, not pull through, and you will lose energy. Therefore, your bow's not pushing that arrow like it would be if you do it right. So you want to make sure that you maintain a consistent release every single shot. The same over and over and over and over again so that you are having consistent energy out of your bow. That is critical. The weight of your arrows, when they drop, you got to learn that stuff with your own equipment. That's the secret. It is right there. All right, I'm going to shoot this other target, and maybe you guys will be able to see. This is closer, but I'm going to show you guys how much I can't this bow. Watch this. It's not all the way down, and it's not vertical. It's right here, just like that, and you pull through the shot. So in other words, guys, I want you to watch me just pull, pull through this shot. It's kind of like once I'm there, no matter how long I hold it or don't hold it, when everything's right and my mind says, yes, yes, it's there, I just start rotating, just start rotating. That's it, and I mean, man, you can absolutely drill them. That's why I love long bows so much. I do every time. Just the pull through is so important. It truly is. Like I mentioned in a lot of other videos, you don't release a string with a traditional bow. You don't release it. You don't. You let it come as a surprise as you are expanding. When you start expanding, expanding, it just comes off. It comes off your fingers. The shot explodes, and as long as you don't collapse the bow arm, drop your elbow, any of that stuff, that arrow is going where you want it to go. I'll guarantee you. So guys, I hope you've enjoyed this, and I hope it's a help to you. If you own a longbow, and you're shooting longbows, try it even with your recurve. I promise you it's probably going to be a game changer if you haven't done it. Get out there and run about a two o'clock count, and even if you need to squint one eye, if you need to close one eye or squint it to get a little bit of tunnel vision to hone in, hey, great, lots of people do it. It really works. I promise you it works, but find what does really, really work best for you. Find what works best for you and do it, but I'll promise you guys if you will open up that sight picture a little bit, if you'll open it up by the canning of the bow and learn how to rotate and pull through that shot, oh my gosh, your accuracy will go through the roof. I'll guarantee it will, guys. So thank you for joining me on Instinctive Addiction Archery. I'm your host Jeff Phillips. Love you guys so much. Thank the good Lord in heaven for everything he gives us to enjoy, including these cool bows, arrows, and all the stuff we get to do, and the help to do it. Until next time, God bless you.