• Sunday – Somerset County Champs – Hereford
• Monday – FITA Round
• Tuesday – Field Round
• Wednesday – 2 Way Longbow Western Round
• Thursday – Double 2 Way Clout
• Friday – Western Round
• Saturday & Sunday – Double Hereford

You can find out more and download the entry forms from here

Denys and her sliding penguin shot

Woohoo!

Two days of archery shooting barebow – one GNAS Indoor Field Shoot and one GNAS Indoor Target Shoot:

Westcott Indoors (GNAS rules) happened on the Saturday morning. I’m not going to talk too much about this as I have the NFAS one coming up this weekend. I did however win gold so I’m really happy!

Bournemouth Indoor shoot was on Sunday – a double Portsmouth round – I shot like a plank but managed to come away with a trophy and two gold medals

Any hoo – looking forwards to a packed and fun archery season ahead!

Sam x

It was slowly getting better then field archery took over massively during 2011 and I didn’t get round to doing any clout comps at all. Anyway – I had my first practice in years on the 2nd of January 2012:

Check out my arrows!!! One's even in the flag!!!

I managed to score 125 for a double clout

You can see the progression

I’m actually quite excited about it! I am going to be doing a few clouts this year including the ones at Dunster & Devizes and have also been convinced to go and do the Cumbria clout weekend with Denys & Brian – plus I may even go to the National Champs in October…

The goal is to get my next two tassel awards – (blue and red) and complete three clouts for a ranking.

2012 will be an awesome archery year!!!

See NCAS website

That's dedication!

If I don’t see you at our ‘Not Boxing Day’ shoot than I hope to see you in 2012 xxx

January: Westcott Indoors

Always a fab shoot and always a pleasure! Great way to start the new archery season and catch up with friends! I’ll be doing both the GNAS and NFAS one next year so hope to see everyone there x See my report

Great shoot - 2 sessions, 2 bowstyles and 2 medals!

February: Wand shoot!

So much fun! The idea was to hit a 6 foot plank on wood 120yrds away. Well this was a challenge but nevertheless it was great fun and I made so many new GNAS friends x

Just a tad excited about hitting it 3 times!!!

March: BUCS Indoors and DWAA County Champs

Both comps were on the same weekend – both shooting indoors at 20yrds. I was really happy to have come fourth at BUCS (British Uni Comp) and won the County Champs! Gave me the belief that I could be a target archer x See more here

Me & Lexi from Southampton Uni archery Club - both respresenting barebow ladies in the south!

 April: Osprey Triple, primitive bow making & Scottish Champs

Ahhh the Osprey Triple! What an amazing event! shooting a half FITA70, 12 target Woodsman field round and a single clout. Great fun, great people and I got to be Lady P too!  Great fun alongside Chris B & Denys xxx Read about it here.

Denys counts her arrows

Another great archery moment was making my own bow. It started off as a bit of hazel chopped down from my club’s woodland. After seasoning for 3 months my good friend Andy showed and helped me to make it. You can read more about it here.

Under Andy's careful guidance

Scottish Champs 2011. This was my first time shooting barebow at a field archery national comp. I did really well despite the awful weather on day 1 and came away with a silver! I had a great time and enjoyed the accommodation and company of Lyn, Garfield, Owen, Caroline, Luke, Laura, Jo and Roger. I also got to meet some wonderful archers from Dunbrody in Ireland   See my report here.

My beautiful Scottish medal xxx

May: Primitive Archery Weekend and 3D Champs

Being as I had made my own bow, I thought I’d pop along and meet others of a similar bent. This turned out to be one of the best weekends I have ever had! It involved camping from the Friday to Sunday – Saturday was a day for playing around the woods and having  go and looking at some other primitive crafts. You can read about it here. Cheers Wally for organising this – I made so many new friends xxx

Fab!

My first 'kill' with my new bow x

Check out the pretties!

Yes – so the NFAS 3D Champs also marked my 30th birthday! So chuffed that I could share it with so many of my archery friends. One of my best friends even made me a special cake to share. You can see more of her cakes (and order some) by going to her website www.hannahbananabakery.co.uk

Yup - very normal!

The comp went really well and I ended up winning the Bronze medal for ladies Barebow!!! What a perfect 30th birthday present Read my report here.

My best shot of the whole comp; pro-killing the raptor!

Me and our new chairman 'Mr List' with our bronze awards!

June: Druids Solstice Weekend

I always love doing Druids weekend shoot. It was my first one so I try to never miss it. It also marked a low point in my year as I was suffering quite bad with a frozen shoulder. It just kept catching in the socket and was very painful. Instead of pulling out of the comp I was convinced to shoot HT with some old arrows and my old 24lb limbs. Never shot HT before – just worked out what my ‘point on’ was and away I went. To my surprise I bloody won it! Not sure how? (the Black Rat Scrumpy may have something to do with it!). Well my report is here

Me and the lovely Lee Phillips - HT winners!

July: Jim’s Jungle Jaunt 

If you’re a wooden arrow shooter then you must get your butt down to Jim’s Jungle Jaunt. This year I decided to shoot my primitive bow as I knew a few peeps would be going with theirs – plus I’d asked to shoot with Andy so he could see me in action with the bow he showed me how to make. I had wonderful groups both days and very much enjoyed the evening’s entertainment – especially Wally’s ‘Magic trick’

Happy times Day 1

Great times at Jungle Jims' xxx Day 2

August:  South West Challenge & Toad Hollow

Every August marks the South West Challenge. This was my second year doing it and for some reason it seemed so much harder! Still, spending 10 days with some of the most wonderful people you could ever meet, in gorgeous countryside shooting everyday – what’s not to like? And leaving with three silver and a bronze medal wasn’t bad either

Me and my girlies - Anita & Nic x

Dead fishy!

Last day

Toad Hollow certainly know how to put on a shoot. This year they were at their new venue and it was stunning! The first day I shot with Simon who sadly has just passed away. He shot really well and even won the bronze medal in his category – not bad for someone fighting cancer:

Great shots from all of us!

RIP Simon Metcalfe - gone too soon xxx

September:  NFAS National Champs

I have never enjoyed the Nationals – I always end up with groups who take it too seriously! I can’t relax and therefore never shoot well. This year was totally different. Both days I had fantastic groups! I even managed to come fourth. Owen won his category too with many other southern archers claiming medals

My wicked group on day 1

And my very girly group on day 2 (Sorry Rob!)

October:  Artemis & Green Meadow’s first shoots!

Both these clubs put on their first ever NFAS shoots this year and as we have very good friends in each club we decided to travel the distance to Derby & Wales to support them. Great shoot venues for both clubs – they should be very proud of themselves xxx

All 9 of us 'Southerners' managed to take home a medal up in Derby - great course guys xxx

Me and Morwenna xxx

Me and 'Uncle Ken'

November: XX Archers

I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard in my life! I shot with Charlie from Herod’s Wood and  two archers from Harlequin – Craig & Gavin. Bloody hell – the whole day was a giant game of innuendo bingo! Don’t know how many times I blushed! Great day with great people x

Craig, Gavin and Charlie - what had I let myself in for?

This is how they earned the name '3D Appreciation Society'

 December: Archery Tag and Standford Pudding Shoot

Boo – the year is over and I have no more comps But it did end in a BANG! Black Cat Archery invited me and some friends along to try out their new sport of archery tag – think paintball but with bows and arrows! It was great fun! We also had a play around their field course – great venue and great people!

Nikki, Craig ('appreciating' a 3D) and Chris at Black Cat Archery

The Standford Archers Pudding shoot was great last year – so no way was I gonna miss it this year! Great that I also claimed a county record too Thanks to Craig, Denys, Brian, Gavin, Nikki, Michelle, Phil, Jeanette, Alan and Charlotte for inviting us to join them for dinner afterwards x

Brian, Gavin and Denys x

Ladies loving the sugar!

Big hugs to all my archery friends – old and new! My life would be so boring without you xxx

The lovely guys and gals at Black Cat Archery in Swindon invited me and a few friends along to try out this new sport from America. It’s a bit like paintball but with bows and arrows! Eight of us archers went long to try it out and wow – what fun we had!!!

I have put together a short vid below to give a glimpse of what we got up to:

The session lasted around two hours – would probably be longer for those new to archery.

Great thing about Black Cat Archery is that they have fantastic archery facilities and we got a chance to do a 24 target field round afterwards.

Yes I’m bruised and battered, but so was everyone else! If you’re looking for something a bit different for a work away day, birthday gathering, stag do etc then please give this a go!!!

http://www.blackcatarchery.com/

Thanks to Jo, Pete, Andy, Owen, Chris, Craig and Nikki for their lovely company today xxx

So far I have:

• Bowtech Equalizer compound,
• Hoyt Nexus recurve with G3 limbs
• KAP Winstar riser with challenger limbs
• An Andy Soars AFB
• My self-made stick bow

Next year I plan to do Dunster week which includes a Western round just for longbows so I thought perhaps I should get one! At Druids Solstice Shoot this year I had a play with one of John Cannings longbows – however it was promised to another archer He has agreed to make me one very similar to it – a bamboo-backed osage and greenheart!

You can see more images of John’s bows by going to Druids’ website: http://druidsfieldarchers.club.officelive.com/JCanningsLongbows.aspx

I had an awful shoot last year and didn’t even make it to 400! My handicap suggests that I should be shooting around 420. Never-the-less I managed to come 19th in Britain and 49th in the World but I really hope to do better!

This weekend I’ll be competing in a club comp in the morning – a memorial field shoot to remember Pete Corbin – a former member of South Wilts. I’ll be bringing my friend Lexi from Southampton Uni Archery Club along to the field comp and we’ll then be off to the BBCs – session C at Ballands.

Here’s hoping we can both get into the top 15 this year!

Sam xxx

Cheeky!

I’d just like to point out that he did take his normal shots first prior to having a go this way

Well recently Black Cat Archery (based in Swindon, England)  sent me a link to this:

They’re actually offering sessions on this! You can see their website here: http://www.blackcatarchery.com/archery%20tag.html

I really want to have a go – if you do too then please put your name down at the bottom of this post!!! Let’s have a play!!!