I would suggest that it would be helpful. You can't be too fit for any sport and rowing will provide you with some useful aerobic exercise whilst being one of a few forms of exercise that utilises the same muscles as when drawing a bow.

I coach at Oxford uni where there is a fairly strong rowing tradition, most people will give it a go at some point during their degree. Some of the best archers I've ever worked with are college rowers, better still are the ones who have replaced the dawn river outings with more archery practice but kept the land (ie rowing machine) training! The muscle groups used in the back and shoulders are very similar to those used for archery; the exercise also helps with core strength and muscle balance - if all you do is archery the asymmetry of muscle use can have some interesting long term effects.

There's a good training guide at the Concept 2 website - Concept2 Training Guide - Training - Concept2. But if any senior coaches fancy coming up with something more archery specific I think we'd all benefit by it (hint hint hint).

That's really good to know napolienne - I have a water rower and can see that rowing mirrors the dumbell rowing exercises that do appear in archer training manuals. They have a great video recently put up on their website that says rowing also build back/core strength - also good for archer!

Its source is from here

Crossing the Line: Cycling and Rowing