Archery Tips | How to Shoot Extreme Angles

Archers spend hours of practice working on shot technique and form. Days, weeks, and months are spent striving to develop repeated accuracy. While in practice this can be achieved, real-world scenarios can cause archers to throw form out the window. One such scenario is when an archer is forced to shoot an extreme angle. Whether it’s in a tournament or while bow hunting in the field, you need to know how to approach shooting these tough angles correctly. These archery tips should tell you how to do just that!

When you are shooting at an angle, the most important thing to remember is to keep your proper form. This is true for every different scenario. Tough tournament courses in rugged terrain can throw even the best archers off. Hunting scenarios such as an elevated whitetail stand, down a steep incline on a fall elk hunt, or uphill at sheep are uncontrollable shot opportunities that will happen. There is no way to avoid these tough shots, so the best thing for you to do is learn how to correctly keep your form and shoot these tough angles.

The correct process of shooting tough angles can be broken down into a two-step process.

Step 1: Starting with correct form

When shooting extreme angles the bow should be drawn back level using the same correct form that is used in practice. The bow is drawn level and the anchor point locked in.

Step 2: Bending at the waist

Once you have drawn level and have the correct anchor you need to acquire your target. This is where the problems normally start. Most archers will skip the first step, drawing uphill or downhill immediately without first achieving the proper form. This will usually shorten their draw which will affect the shot. To correctly acquire the target when shooting extreme angles, the shooter should bend at the waist after the draw is completed. The technique of bending at the waist after the bow is drawn and the shooter is locked in allows a target to be acquired either uphill or downhill without negatively affecting accuracy.

Many coveted hunts take place in the rugged country that requires shooting at steep angles. A shot opportunity at a bighorn or desert sheep, mule deer, mountain goat, and even a big bull elk are often not presented on level ground. Rugged terrain and country often present these shots. Using these archery tips when presented with this situation will ensure that you use correct form when conditions and terrain present an uphill or downhill shot.

Learning how to shoot up and downhill is a critical skill for any archer to have. By bending at the waist and holding the correct form after a level draw cycle, shooting on steep angles can be completed accurately. Following the archery tips in this blog will allow you to shoot with the correct form throughout the entire shot regardless of the angle.

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