Practice Days
We had a few minutes to spare when we arrived, so we quickly gathered our stuff and headed to the defense range to test our skills and get a look at what the woods looks like in the area to determine what we would be up against when we hit the ranges on Thursday morning. It didn't take us long to see we would have our hands full. Everyone seemed to shoot well in the 10-target practice range except me. Half of my arrows were 5s, along with a few 8s. Although it didn't do anything to my confidence, it didn't give me a fuzzy feeling either.
Everyone in the house decided we would shoot at a local range in the morning, then head over to the site of the event to get our cards and do some shooting there, too. I felt confident going into the practice round. Well, after shooting 20 targets, I began wondering what the heck was going on. I could count on one hand the number of 10s I shot. Just like the prior evening, I shot a handful of 5s. I shortened the throw on my release in hopes that might help. I took a guess that the strap might have stretched, which in turn had made my draw length a pinch longer.
After we got done at the local range, we headed to pick up our cards and shoot another defense round. After shortening the release, I found my groove on the defense course. Then, all hell broke loose again, and I hit one target in the back and shot over another one. I had the correct number on both of them. The last arrow I shot for practice sailed over a wolverine at 43 yards. Although most people probably would've been panic-stricken, I let the events of the last 24 hours fall on deaf ears. I know my ability, and I figured the issues were from a combination of things but most likely from being unfocused and tired after traveling.
Day 1
When I got to the tent, the rest of my group was there. My group consisted of Glenn Meadows, Jim Livak and Bill McCall. All of these guys are easy going and laid back, so I knew it would be a relaxing day as far as dealing with personalities goes. I looked forward to that. Originally, I was scheduled to be in another group, but I saw in the revised shoot times that I had been moved and my start time on Day 1 was moved up about a half hour and my start time on Day 2 was moved back about the same. I would also be shooting with different people than I had originally been placed with. My buddies Mike and Barry also had their start times changed, so we all made sure each other was aware of the changes so none of us missed our start time.
As we began walking to the first target, the rain began coming down. It was a light drizzle at first, so I decided to leave my rain jacket on to try to stay dry as long as possible. After cards were drawn, I learned I would be following Jim Livak. Jim always has arrows around the 11, so I knew I would have good aiming spots throughout the two days of shooting.
Looking at the first target, I saw we would be shooting at a fallow deer. I have always done well on fallow deer, so I welcomed it when I saw it. When my turn came around, I was ready. The target was set in the low to mid 40-yard range, and the number stuck out to me when I looked at it. I had 100% confidence when I drew the bow.
When the pin hit the white spot that I wanted to hit next to, the sight picture momentarily got a little choppy. Then, the shot broke, and it felt like someone had cut the string with scissors. Instantly, my arrow appeared inside-out of the 11-ring. I was off to a good start. As we readied ourselves to move to the next target, the rain really started coming down.
Getting to the next target, I felt really good when I looked at it. It was a black bear, and the number stuck out. I set my sight and waited for my turn to shoot. When my turn came around, I had already given in to the rain and decided to shed my coat to shoot. I would go between taking it on and off when I was shooting and walking. The pin settled slightly below one of the nocks I could see, and seconds later my arrow appeared exactly where I was looking... 11.
Moving along to the next target, an uphill Corsican ram, I was a little hesitant when dialing my sight. I knew it was between 45 and 50 yards, but had a tough time narrowing it down. After listening to an arrow, I felt more confident. I've always found it easy to aim at the ram because is has a ridge that runs directly through the middle of the 11, and it is slightly lighter in that spot on most targets. Once again, my pin sat down, and I executed a good shot and the arrow landed an inch above the 11.
As we meandered up the hill, I continued getting good numbers and executing good shots. Then, we got to a long uphill grazing doe. Looking at it from the stake, I knew it was going to be one of those targets that could separate people. It was the first one of the day, and I knew it was a swing target. People who stayed in double digits on it would most likely gain ground on others.
Having that target, I felt confident with the number, but I knew the uphill shot at the longer distance would be tough. Besides being uphill and long, it was also on a side hill. When my shot broke, I felt good about it, and the arrow landed less than an inch directly below the 11. I had no gotten into a rhythm that can best be explained as "being in the zone." My mind was clear, my shots were effortless, and the results matched those two things. I was on my way to having a day that many dream about.
After shooting, I sat on my stool and waited for the others. When it was Bill's turn, his light began playing tricks on him and eventually quit. We tried valiantly to fix it and backed up three groups in the process. By the time everything was done, the light still didn't work and we had spent about 30 minutes on that grazing doe target trying to avoid making Bill head of for an equipment repair. Finally, with the three groups backed up and another one coming onto the scene, Bill had no choice but to head off the range to get it fixed.
When we got to the next target, everything that had been with me seemed to instantly disappear. As I drew my bow on an uphill mountain lion on a side hill, I knew I had the number. However, when the pin hit the target, it was jittery and I could feel tension for the first time that day. This led to a slightly weak shot, but I felt the shot was still good enough to hang 10... but it didn't. The arrow sat directly below the 10 line... my first 8 of the day.
As we made our way through the next few targets, I struggled mightily to get the feelings back that I had experienced until the delay. As the authors and sports psychologists say, you simply cannot bring yourself into the zone on command. It's something that just happens. Unfortunately, I can count the number of times I've been in the zone while shooting. I simply don't get there too often, yet I was there... until that break. I would now have to navigate my way through the day and try to hold on to any momentum I had gained. The momentum was quickly fading, and I was coming back to everyone else's reality.
When the shooting became difficult after the break, I also lost my numbers. I began having a tough time judging and this led to hesitancy in my shots. Finally, I got back on track on a long ram when I inside outed the 11. As I began finding my way back to the place I had been earlier in the day, my mind began becoming quiet again. Then, we came upon a tough javelina, which I knew would give many shooters a problem. I felt confident with the number when I looked at it. It appeared to be on a rock outcropping in the middle of some big oaks. We were shooting across a hill at it and between a few trees. I could see the white dots in the 10-rings, so I put the pin on them and executed the best shot I could make. The arrow landed just below the 11. That shot gave me the feeling I had experienced earlier in the round. Then, I heard a side-by-side coming up the hill. Not paying any attention to it, I continued through the course.
When we got to a wolverine target, I looked at it and a number popped into my head. Bill was also finally able to rejoin our group on that target. We sat back and tried to get our order back to where it was when we started when Bill was a part of our group. After Glenn shot an arrow into the back of the wolverine, I began second-guessing my number, but I was pretty sure I had a good one. When it was my turn to shoot, I had a hard time getting my shot to go off. Finally, when it broke, the arrow struck a pinch left of the 10-ring.
After reeling off a bunch of 10s and gradually finding my way back into a groove, my thoughts were running laps around the inside of my skull once again. Moving to the next target, a stone sheep that was in a dark setting, I felt good about my number. Once again, I struggled with the timing on my shot and probably held it a little longer than I should've. The arrow struck just outside of the 10-ring to the right.
With two targets left, I saw the camera man standing behind the next stake. He was talking to another guy while we were readying ourselves. After losing my concentration 15 minutes earlier, I was doing everything I could to regain focus. I struggled mightily and ended up shooting another 8 before finally centering the 11-ring on the final target, an elk. I got off the course at 4 down, even after all of the lapses in concentration I encountered throughout the day. While I was focused, I lost focus when I needed it the most. I can't explain why it happened, but looking back at the scorecard, I dropped 10 points when I let myself become distracted. I've always prided myself on being mentally strong, so sitting here writing this is difficult when I realize what I allowed to happen to my mind. I simply needed to be better.
Day 2
Moving into Day 2, I knew I had a chance to make the dance. I was sitting in 10th place, but I was only two points off from the fifth score and the top five scores make it into the shootdown round. I also knew I would know where I stood as soon as I came off the course because my group would be the last group of senior pros to finish.
Strolling across the dam with my group to start the day, I spotted a Dahl sheep on the side of the hill. Uphill shots are never fun, and when you face one on the first shot of the day, it can be a real challenge due to the inability to hold the pin as steady as you can on flat ground. When a little nervous energy is thrown into the mix, the shot can create some anxiety. However, I didn't get much anxiety. Instead, I put the pin where I wanted and pulled until the shot broke. The arrow landed a fingernail width under the 10-ring. It wasn't how I wanted to start my day, but I knew it was early, and I would have plenty of time to get back on track.
After barely catching a 10 high on the next target, a bedded buck, I felt relieved. Maybe I could finally settle in and get going. When I walked to the next target and saw a bomb of an alligator, I had a gut feeling that it was going to be one heck of a day. I would have every opportunity to get into the shootoff if I did my part because the course was set to separate people.
The shadows danced wildly on the alligator as I got ready to shoot. When my shot broke, I felt good about it. However, when I looked at the arrow through binoculars, I saw that I had missed the 10 to the left. It's a shot I think I probably would've capitalized on if I hadn't been the first one to shoot. The arrow hit pretty close to where I was aiming. Now, three targets in, I was in a hole. I needed to stop the bleeding.
Over the next eight targets, I ran off five 12s and felt like I was on cruise control. The numbers were coming easily to me, and the arrows were hitting behind the pin. After centering an incredibly tough fallow deer that was near max yardage and straight uphill, as well as an uphill lynx at about 41 yards, I could feel the momentum building. I was back in that zone from the previous day and felt like luck was on my side. I let down a lot, but it wasn't from tension or anything of the sort. I was making sure I didn't shoot any shot that I believed might be anything less than perfect.
After shooting a strutting turkey and hitting it about a half inch to the left of the 10, I still felt good. Leading off the next target, a big buck that was set across a small ravine and on top of the hill on the far side, it was a no-doubt number. I rolled the sight to 50 and tried making the best shot I could make. With the way the sun was hitting it, it was hard to pick a spot to aim. When the shot broke, I felt great about it, and the arrow appeared exactly where I wanted it.
When we got to the target, there were two arrows that took a while to call. One arrow was at the bottom of the 11 and one was at the top. My arrow was the one on the top. After it was studied for a while, it was called out. There aren't many arrows that get shot in tournaments that could be closer than that one. It was just a little bit of bad luck with the way the ring was molded. It probably would've been considered in if the 11 had been molded with less of a rise on the line at the top. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. At the point in time it happened, I did't pay any attention to it at all.
The next target was close, but it had disaster written all over it. It was a bedded stone sheep, and it was tilted severely backward. You could've shot at the 10 and missed by two yards and gotten a zero. This almost forced people to aim low, and I'm sure it probably caused a few people to shoot fives on the low side. I took my chances and held my pin in the middle. I smoked the 11 and felt relieved to walk away from the target with all of my arrows and double digits on my score card.
As we neared the end of the round, I could see I would be ending on a downhill brown bear followed by an uphill coyote. I had all the confidence in the world going into them. When I anchored and began my shot on the brown bear, I felt like I had too much yardage on it, but I didn't dare hold the pin low. Instead, I followed through with my shot. The arrow landed on the 8-line above the 10-ring... one target to go.
As I walked to the last station, I felt confident that I would make the shootoff. Looking at the target, I knew they had surely saved the best for last. There was a coyote looking at me. It was standing on a flat spot at the top of a hill, and it was leaning backward. Once again, the 10-ring had been almost cut in half due to the target leaning backward. If it wasn't max distance (50 yards) I knew it was pretty close. However, I also knew if I held 50 in the center and happened to be off a few yards on the high side, there was no way my arrow would stick in the target due to it being leaned back so far. I'm not sure if they target was like that the entire weekend (or day) or if it had gotten pushed over through the course of the day. Either way, it was going to be a bear of a shot.
I was the last shooter to shoot, and Bill had one in the core line low for a 5, while Glenn and Jim were both in the 10 ring. Glenn was a low 10 and Jim had one in the 11. Not sure what to do, I set my sight on 47 and decided to play it "safe." I figured 47 would keep me in the 8-ring either way. Unlike most of the day, when the pin hit the target, it settled quickly. With the backward angle on the target, my mind kept me from putting the pin where it actually needed to be, so I held it on Glenn's arrow near the bottom of the 10-ring. Then, I executed my best shot of the weekend. The shot was relaxed and powerful. I could't have made a better shot if I tried 100 times. The arrow struck the target about two inches below the 10... but was in the 5. I shot a 5 on my last target of the weekend.
There's where my sight was set for the last target... 47 yards.
Walking back to the tent, some of my peers were waiting. After handing my card in, I instantly learned that I was the first guy out of the shootoff. I had missed it by one point. It was a helpless feeling when I heard the news. It was like getting throat punched while others stood back and watched. For the second time in three years, I sat on the outside looking in... one point from going to the dance. Then, I thought back to last year. Although I wasn't the first guy out, I had destroyed two of Darrin Christenberry's arrows, making them unshootable. One was in the 11 and one in the 10, and both of my arrows landed in the 8-ring, which led to losing five points that I should've gotten due to the quality of my shot. The arrow actually hit and destroyed two arrows in the rings that would've put be in the shootdown round. I shot an 11 and a 10 but got two 8s. That was all she wrote this year. I wrote my score down and signed my name. Devastated, I walked away.
My Final Thoughts
I learned a few valuable lessons at this tournament. You should never lose your confidence after having a few bad practice sessions. All of my friends figured I would train wreck myself off the side of the mountain after they shot with me in practice. I, however, walked onto the range on Thursday morning with 100% confidence I would get the job done.
I also learned that I need to work on keeping distractions distanced from my mind. While it's OK to acknowledge distractions, I can't let them take control of my mind and wreak havoc while running laps around my skull. That's exactly what I did on the first day, and it led to me giving up 8 to 10 points. I just gave the points away like people paying a quarter to feed the ducks birdseed at the pond in the zoo. It was my own fault, and looking back on it, I can't believe I allowed it to happen.
When sports psychologists tell people that they have no control of when they enter the zone or when they leave it, I can now say that I understand that completely and fully. I was 100% in the zone during the early portion of my round on Day 1. It was similar to an out-of-body experience. While I was there and in the moment, it was almost as if I was watching it from afar. Everything was effortless and required minimal work. My mind was quiet, and I enjoyed seeing myself perform at an elite level, even though I was watching from some other place, a place that seemed dreamlike.
I wish I could return to that "zone" regularly. I know when I was there for about an hour, I was headed into uncharted territory. My ship was sailing through calm waters while everyone else was hanging on to the rails and praying the crashing waves wouldn't sweep them overboard. In my archery career, I've been to that place only a handful of times, and two of those times I won the IBO World Championship and another time I won the NFAA Indoor Nationals. However, this particular dance with the zone reminded me the most of one year when I won the third leg of the National Triple Crown. After shooting my ninth 11 in a 10-target stretch that day, one of my competitors turned to another guy in my group and mouthed, "WTF." I actually felt the same way as I marched through the beginning of the round on Day 1. I felt like I could never miss that weekend, just as I felt it Thursday. If I could ever bottle the feeling of being in the "zone," I'd bottle it and sell it. I"m not sure if I would want it all the time, though. Maybe what makes the times I've experienced it so special is that fact that it has been so difficult to find, yet I know it's there waiting for me to tap into. I will find it again. I'll continue searching. I had my hands on it, and I know I'm too determined to let it come and go like it did this time. This was a first for me. I've never had it appear and disappear, so I will learn from this experience to ensure I stay in the moment and let it ride with me until the end the next time it beckons me to jump on the train and enjoy the journey.
I have much more to say about the weekend, but I've decided to write about it in separate entries so I don't take up so much room. Please check back in the coming days to read more about different things I experienced at the IBO World Championship. I'll be writing about my archery family as well as the journey my teammates and I took to land on top of the podium for the National Triple Crown. I hope you come back to read those too.
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ReplyDeleteTodd Mead day one was a for sure roller coaster,
ReplyDeleteAnd day 2 was a very tough course.
It was a a pleasure as usual to shoot with you buddy.
Thanks again to you and Glen for walking thru with me to finish my first day round. I was thankful for our good group.
I am thankful for our friendship😁