Speaker A
So in today's video I want to give a bit more explanation about the bow shoulder and specifically aimed at beginners.
Learn how beginners can correctly position the bow shoulder in archery, avoid common mistakes, and improve posture and alignment.
Key Takeaways
- The bow shoulder must be lowered by rolling it back to keep the scapula flat, not just by pushing it down.
- Head position and flexibility directly affect shoulder height and alignment during shooting.
- Proper posture and body positioning are essential to maintain a stable bow shoulder throughout the shot.
- Beginners should focus on feeling and awareness to correct common mistakes early.
- Coaches can use these insights to help beginners develop good archery habits from the beginning.
Summary
- Beginners often have a high and rolled bow shoulder, which is a common issue affecting shooting technique.
- Simply lowering the bow shoulder is ineffective; the shoulder must be rolled back to keep the scapula flat on the rib cage.
- Proper feeling and awareness of the bow shoulder position is crucial before focusing on alignment.
- Head position significantly impacts shoulder height; turning the head can cause the shoulder to raise unintentionally.
- Improving neck flexibility through stretches can help maintain proper head and shoulder positioning.
- Maintaining a straight head position and avoiding forward head posture makes it easier to achieve correct bow shoulder placement.
- Different anchor points, such as side anchor versus under the chin, influence head and shoulder positioning.
- Body posture and chest position are important factors that affect the ability to keep the bow shoulder down when drawing the bow.
- Progressive stages include lifting the arm without shoulder movement, then with head turned, and finally with the bow and draw added.
- The video offers solutions and exercises for beginners and coaches to improve bow shoulder technique from the start.
Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown
Speaker A
So I've got another video about the bow shoulder and some kind of more advanced topics.
Speaker A
But in this video I want to describe exactly how to get the bow shoulder position for beginners, common mistakes and reasons why, you know, beginners might have a high bow shoulder or not good alignment with the bow shoulder and stuff like that.
Speaker A
So that's what I want to look at and to start with, I want to kind of begin with something obvious.
Speaker A
So it's very, very common for beginners to have a, you know, a high bow shoulder.
Speaker A
So maybe you'll see beginners with a shoulder that's quite close to the neck or is raising up and also slightly rolled that way.
Speaker A
And it's really probably one of the most common issues that beginners face.
Speaker A
But it's very clear that if you just ask someone to lift their arm, they don't have this issue.
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So for example, if you just say to someone stand still and I'll do it with my other arm for this.
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If you say stand still, lift your arm like this, they don't raise up like this.
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Most of the time people are able to simply lift.
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So why is it then that when a beginner starts archery, it's very often that they'll get the bow and do this and then have the shoulder really high and not in a good position.
Speaker A
So there must be some other things at play here.
Speaker A
And crucially, I want to show you what these things are and then also show you the solutions so that if you're a beginner or even if you're a coach that's helping beginners, that kind of thing, you can hopefully help them get the correct technique right from the start.
Speaker A
And if you're that archer, you can understand a bit more about why that's happening and what you can do to remedy it and get the bow shoulder in a better position.
Speaker A
So the three main things it comes down to are feeling, head position and posture, and then the body position and the chest.
Speaker A
So I'll go through these one by one, but I want to start with the feeling.
Speaker A
Now what I mean by this is if I demonstrate with a band here, many archers when they start, the feeling they're trying to get or maybe they've been told or even they haven't been told it, but they just kind of naturally do it.
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Is they, they try and push the bow at the set position and they try and basically draw like this.
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So you can already see that this is maybe quite a typical way that a beginner would would kind of draw the bow.
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Now the issue here is in the bow shoulder, the feeling of the bow shoulder is actually already, I'm already high here and then when I lift, it's going to be high as well.
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And you can see it's high here and up towards the face and a lot of tension.
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Now when I talk about the feeling, what I mean is in order to solve this, the feeling isn't actually just lowering the bow shoulder.
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We always have to deal with the height first.
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So if you've got a high bow shoulder and it's rolled over like this, you always have to deal with the height before you deal with the alignment.
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You can't get good alignment of the bow shoulder if it's high.
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But if you're in this rolled over position and high, just telling someone to lower it often doesn't work because if I'm in this position and I just try and lower it, it's quite strenuous.
Speaker A
I kind of feel a bit of a a stretch or not quite a kind of a pain under the arm, but it's quite strenuous.
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But actually what you need to do is it needs to feel like you're because it's rolled over, you need to actually roll it back the other way and focus on keeping the scapula flat on the rib cage.
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So you can see here how the scapula is not flat on the rib cage and then if I effectively rolled the bow shoulder, I'm not rolling it in a bad way.
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I'm returning it to its normal position.
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So from here, there.
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So do you see that?
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So it goes from, I'll do it from this angle, it goes from here, here.
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And the feeling is actually, it feels like I'm going from this rolled and I'm rolling it back and you can obviously see when I do that, the change in the chest position and the posture as well.
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So it's really important to the first thing is make sure it's not rolled over and high that way.
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And the feeling in order to get it, is it feels like the scapula is going from here and it feels like it's then lowering and reverting back so that it's flat on the rib cage.
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So I'll I'll turn around and show you.
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So it's going from here to there.
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Now the issue many people face with this is it feels like the alignment's worse.
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Because you're effectively moving the shoulder from here to here.
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So you're actually moving the shoulder further from the line that you might be trying to achieve.
Speaker A
But that's fine.
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Because we need to get the shoulder in the correct height, not have it rolled over and then you can get the good alignment by rotating around the chest, getting the body alignment and getting that good.
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So that's the first thing, the feeling.
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And later on, I'll show you how to get the correct feeling at the set position and then move that through the shot as well.
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Now the second thing I mentioned is the head position.
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And this is also absolutely crucial, it goes hand in hand with the posture and the overall, you know, position of the upper body.
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But the head position is super important.
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So the first thing is, when you shoot for a long time, you develop more flexibility in the way that you turn your head normally.
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So for example, I'm right-handed, so I normally look left to the target, so I'm more flexible that way now.
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Whereas if I turn right, I'm not as flexible.
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And this is really important because when you start, you're not as flexible and turning the head makes it more likely that you raise the shoulder.
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And you can check if this is the case for you simply by looking straight ahead and lifting your arm.
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And when you do this, it should be, as you can see, shoulder's fairly neutral.
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If you then turn your head and find that your shoulder is creeping up like this, which is quite common actually.
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For people to turn the head and then lift the shoulder as they raise the bow, then you obviously need to make sure that you disconnect these two things.
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Don't allow the turning of the head to make the shoulder come up.
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Also some stretches, I've also made another video on good stretches for archery.
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But neck stretches on this side to increase your range of motion and your flexibility will help with this.
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So another thing with the head is to make sure that you're in a good straight position.
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So if you're, if the target is the camera here, if I'm looking into the into the target and at this position, I already before I lift the bow, I allow the head to come forwards.
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It's going to make this extremely hard to get in the right position because when I come up, I'm going to be high already.
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Can you see how that's high?
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Whereas then if I lift up the head, it makes it a lot easier to get the bow shoulder position.
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I should note that some of the reasons for this are the constraints of the bow and what I mean by that is people will try and maybe bring the string to the face and they're not sure where to go.
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And what that does is that they move the head around and then especially if you've been taught to start with, if you've been taught to have, you know, like a a side anchor rather than under the chin.
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So if you've been taught like this to start with, more like a a bare bow or hunting thing.
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It's very easy to compromise the position of the head.
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So you need to make sure that's good and then maintain it through the shot.
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And I'll show you a bit more about that at the end of the section with the solutions.
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Now finally, the last point is the body position and the chest.
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And what I mean by this is even if you get, so the kind of stages are.
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If you're able to lift your hand and your arm without the shoulder moving up, great.
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If you can do it with your head turned, great.
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Then when you add the complexity of the bow and the draw side, when you add that, it makes it more difficult.
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Because people will often revert back to trying to pull the string and then compromising the shoulder and coming up.
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So the trick here is to make sure that you don't allow the bow to compromise this shoulder.
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You always prioritize posture, head position and the shoulder position first.
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Then you do what you can with the bow and make sure that you're not allowing the bow to change your technique.
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This is hard to feel if you're a beginner, so to make sure of this, you can do it without the bow at first.
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So this is why, you know, it's great to start with a band.
Speaker A
But you can make sure, okay, your posture is here, make sure your set position is good and then when you lift up, you can make sure you're maintaining the shoulder position and not raising it.
Speaker A
Specifically, a couple of things here, having the string and putting too much tension on the string at the set position.
Speaker A
So here.
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So a lot of people when they start, they'll kind of draw the bow a lot and then lift up.
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That is going to make the bow shoulder higher.
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Also having the hand, so the draw hand, having it too close here to the bow side is going to make the bow shoulder come up.
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Trying to align the shoulders too early, yep, so this is you don't want to at this position when you're getting ready.
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You don't want to try and get the shoulder alignment and then come up because this is going to be higher.
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You actually do want to be slightly open to the target and make sure the shoulders are in a good position like here.
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And this is even, for example, I've got a square stance right now.
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But when you start, you still want to be slightly open to the target.
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So that's another thing, you don't want to have to get here and then lift up and do that.
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So that's quite a common thing because people will think, I need to be in a straight line.
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I need to be exactly straight and lift up.
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So that's another thing.
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So solutions for this, if you're a beginner, these are the key points here.
Speaker A
The solutions are, you need to make sure that you're in a good overall posture and your head position is good.
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That's number one.
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So what I mean by good overall posture, no hunching.
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No compromising of the head position, no movement during the draw at any point during the shot.
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So when you're standing, you're ready to dress the target.
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So here I've got a square stance, nice and simple and the target is this way.
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So when I'm here, I make sure I can start upright.
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Shoulders in neutral position, not hunched and then simply turn to the target.
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That's it.
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Simple and then from that moment, then everything stays the same in terms of the head position, body position, all there.
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So turn to the target.
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And then now the crucial thing is as we move into the set position, but now the head is done, shouldn't be any movement.
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No forward, no movement of the head and then also crucially not allowing the turning of the head to lift the shoulder.
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So making sure you're relaxed in there.
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So that's the first thing.
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The second thing is at the set position.
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So when you're here with the bow, you want to make sure that the shoulder is relaxed and it will feel slightly like you're using the muscles of the lower back under the arm to effectively keep the scapula on the rib cage and it will feel like you're actually keeping the scapula close to the spine.
Speaker A
I should clarify, this isn't the long-term feeling that will actually happen and for advanced archers, you don't want to retract the scapula to the spine.
Speaker A
But as a starting point to make sure you don't lift the shoulder, this is what it feels like to beginners.
Speaker A
Okay.
Speaker A
So when you're here at the set position, rather than being in this position and the shoulder is already high, you want to make sure that when you're set, you don't put too much tension on the string.
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And then you also here, you just change the position slightly.
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So you go from that to that.
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And then now it feels like the scapula is just being retracted slightly back towards the spine, using the muscles to stabilize it there.
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Like I said, not the long-term thing, but this is the feeling we go for to make sure you don't lift the bow shoulder.
Speaker A
Now finally, when you're at the set position and when you're drawing the bow, don't try and create a straight line too much in terms of when you're here doing the set.
Speaker A
Most people will try and push the bow hand into the grip and draw the string, put too much tension on the string and then they're trying to get the shoulder alignment like this.
Speaker A
But like I said before, keeping the bow shoulder low is really important and it might feel like effectively you're before you might start here and lift the bow.
Speaker A
So you can see how the shoulder is in more of a a straight line.
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But you want to go from here to there.
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And did you see how the shoulder opened there?
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So it's okay, it will feel for beginners, it will feel kind of odd because it feels like your body is here and the bow is in front of you.
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Does that make sense?
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So instead of that, it's more that.
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And it feels like this shoulder is slightly back and you're keeping it low and then the bow is slightly in front of you.
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And you can see how this is much straighter now this arm and then when you lift, you can then get the alignment through the chest and the body movement.
Speaker A
And I'll talk about that in a separate video, but to start with, don't be afraid to open up slightly.
Speaker A
Going from here to there and allowing the bow to not be so close to you and getting the shoulders a bit more open to the target because that's going to really help keep the bow shoulder low.
Speaker A
So that's been a pretty comprehensive look at the bow shoulder and I wanted to do that so that some beginners who might be wondering how to get the bow shoulder, have got a bit more guidance.
Speaker A
And hopefully it helped anyone who's more of an advanced archer as well and it can help you sort out some issues that you might have with the bow shoulder.
Speaker A
As always, if you enjoyed the video, be sure to smash that like button and subscribe to the channel if you haven't already.
Speaker A
I'll also put the links to social media down below.
Topics:archerybow shoulderbeginner archery tipsarchery techniqueposture in archeryhead position archeryscapula alignmentarchery coachingarchery mistakesarchery training
