Did my first 3D shoot today without really meaning to. I'm in Winona visiting family (a long tradition) and noticed that the local archery club was hosting their annual July 4th 3D shoot. I've never shot 3D before, have never tried to judge yardage, and I only had my skinny field arrows with me. (I've read about how to judge yardage, but that's not quite the same.) I emailed yesterday and asked if range finders were allowed at this shoot. (Thanks to my buddy for loaning his range finder for the weekend so I could set up my practice target more easily at my in-laws' place.) I was told that range finders were fine. It's a casual, fun shoot. No problem then.
When I got to the shoot this morning I noticed the not so fine print on the score card that said "NO RANGE FINDERS." Hmmm… I asked the nice person at the check-in table about it, and she told me that I could go ahead and use one. I didn't feel right about it. I wasn't there to just shoot for fun without turning in a score, and I certainly wasn't going to use a range finder and then turn in a score having done so. I decided to give it a go and put my theoretical yardage judging knowledge to the test.
I connected with a guy who was also by himself and who kindly explained the scoring to me. I was pretty shaky at first. I was judging almost all of them too short. (I did check some of them with my range finder after I shot my arrow.) If I was close I got a 20, but I often misjudged badly and took a 5.
Note: They used a 20-15-5-0 scoring system for this shoot. The 10-ring scored 20, the 8-ring scored 15, the rest of the body scored 5, and a miss was 0. They didn't count the 12-ring for anything, but I kept separate track on my scorecard by marking an X for any 12-ring shots.
Further note: Watch the arrow on the score card. I shot the first two targets then skipped to #15, finished the back half, and then completed the rest of the first half.
My judging started improving, and I made a lot of good shots toward the end (targets #3–#13).
This seemed to be a relatively difficult shoot. There were a lot of targets across gullies which made judging the yardage quite a bit harder. There were quite a few uphill and downhill shots, and a bunch where I had to judge and then shoot through narrow openings between trees. Overall, I'm pretty happy with how I shot, and I came home with the same number of arrows I started with.
I also came to appreciate the larger scopes and fiber pins that 3D shooters use. My small target scope and double-vision TrueSpot scope didn't work very well. There were a lot of instances where I could hardly make out the target when it was sitting in the shadows. I'm sure more light would have helped my score a bit.
I looked at the scorecard and converted my score to what I think the ASA does (i.e., 12-10-8-5-0). That puts me at 38 down for 29 targets. I'm pretty sure I won't have the lowest score of the day.
baratheonpilled
jbbartram-illu
izzy806
dededos