How far do you turn your head?

Jabes

New member
I have a problem that I tilt my head over to the right when I draw which leads to me finding it hard to anchor and get a decent string picture (I am a beginner of about 6 months experience).

This morning I read somewhere (can't find it now) that when you set-up you should turn your head to the 10 o'clock position - I have been twisting my head much further than this - trying to get towards 9 o'clock - and I'm quite flexible so I can pretty much get there - but I notice now that when I do this... my head tilts!

So, can anyone confirm how far you are meant to turn your head before drawing?
 

fbirder

Member
I'm fighting a similar problem. I find that I can stop tilting my head if I concentrate on standing erect (as if I were having my height measured) as I prepare to raise the bow.
 

lbp121

Member
Stand square, shrug shoulders and drop them to make sure not raised. Turn head owl-like to a comfortable angle and stay there during draw.
 

roytherecurve

New member
Be aware that you don't have to turn your head so that your face is square on the the target before you get a good view of what you're aiming at as your eyes will turn too to do the rest!
Straining to see the target is just setting up more tension in the neck which translates down to the shoulders and arms and then goes on to screw up the shot completely.
Stay relaxed and if you can see the target then you've done enough.
Keep the head straight and level, Don't be tempted to twist at the waist to turn the shoulders, and let your eyes do what they're good at without killing yourself to get the shot!
You may have to Review your reference point, but once done, your results will be better without all that extra tension.
 

TexARC

Member
This is a favorite topic of mine. Any archer that looks at the target out of the corner of the eye is most likely short-sheeting his bed. ? OK, try this. Keep facing these words on the screen (and notice you are facing the words with no head tilt, ergo, that with intent comes a subconscious directness in head positioning), but move only your eyes to your target side as far as you can without moving your head. Do you feel "twinges" in the side of your neck away from the target? Maybe a funny feeling in the back of the ear? How can this motion of the eyeball (which is completely isolated in the orbit) cause such sensations in a completely different place? It's neurological!
The short of it is, if you tilt your head, if you fail to rotate your head enough to keep your eyes away from the corners of your sockets(orbits) then you are shooting with less strength than you otherwise would have. It may not be significant to your game but likely it is affecting your ability to control your bow to some adverse amount. A slight degree of tilt is not as clinically significant as a failure to rotate the head to the target, by the way, but rarely in *any* physical endeavor will you purposely take your optical sensory hardware off of "level" since it is attuned to your inner ears' input to the brain. Ever seen a springboard or platform diver purposely tilt the head prior to initiating a dive?
I coach the athlete to increase their range of motion TO the target - it is fundamental to the Kisik Lee NTS method because it is biomechanically the smart thing to do. I blather on at greater length on this topic on the TSAA Coaching Corner blog. Have a go at it and please let me know if it leaves you with questions?
 

Jabes

New member
Thanks all - I think my problem is i am over-rotating, I have just been turning as far as I can, setting up all kinds of tension.

I will experiment this morning!
 

Nightimer

New member
How can this motion of the eyeball (which is completely isolated in the orbit) cause such sensations in a completely different place? It's neurological!

Correct me if I'm wrong but isnt the eye connected to the skull by 4 muscles.
If I am correct, then the eyeball is not isolated,if it was how would it move.
If I am wrong I bow to your greater anatomical knowledge :))
 

joetapley

New member
How can this motion of the eyeball (which is completely isolated in the orbit) cause such sensations in a completely different place? It's neurological!

Correct me if I'm wrong but isnt the eye connected to the skull by 4 muscles.
If I am correct, then the eyeball is not isolated,if it was how would it move.
If I am wrong I bow to your greater anatomical knowledge :))
There was quite a long discussion on this topic on Archery Talk recently. Basically the supposed link between eye position and strength is an archery equivalent of "Magic Crystals" syndrome.

If you want to learn to stop your head tilting put a beanbag on it.
 

geoffretired

Supporter
Supporter
I think tilting the head is almost natural. By that I mean it seems to happen to most beginners. I think it stems from wanting to look along the arrow as with a rifle barrel. As we learn to draw the bow, the arrow rarely approached from dead ahead of the aiming eye. It tends to drift across to our right and the head tilt is an attempt to get the eye over to the arrow.Plus, the arrow is lower than we would want, so tilting also lowers the eye down towards arrow level. By the time an archer has learnt to ignore the arrow during the draw stages, he/she may already have learnt to tilt the head, without knowing. Finding out about the tilt is often done by listening to someone else pointing it out.
How far to turn the head? Well, I guess it needs to be far enough to see past the bridge of the nose. I would suggest it needs to be far enough beyond that to see without eye straining.That probably leaves a bit more travel for most of us.
Within our comfort range of eye movement and head turn, we have to try to get good solid reference points with string hand, string line and face.
We also need to accommodate where the draw hand will be in relation to the draw elbow and draw force line.(When the draw length and shoulders/elbow are well placed.)
I see archers struggling to get the string on the centre of their chins. That usually involves pushing the draw hand across to their left, compared to a naturally aligned position that would place it more to the right.If, when they relax the biceps and allow the string hand to align with the draw elbow, the draw hand is not in solid contact with the face, a slight turn of the head can bring the contact that we want.
 

Whitehart

Well-known member
In the old days you were taught to look at the target (using dominant eye) over the bridge of the nose. - a good place to start

If you side anchor then you will tilt and turn the head further not to mention pushing the string into your face each shot.

Everyone is different so as long as it is not too far round work with your body.
 

roytherecurve

New member
I coach the athlete to increase their range of motion TO the target - it is fundamental to the Kisik Lee NTS method because it is biomechanically the smart thing to do. I blather on at greater length on this topic on the TSAA Coaching Corner blog. Have a go at it and please let me know if it leaves you with questions?
Ok, So here's a question for this one...

Not all archers have the same range of movement in their necks and some will NEVER have the range of motion in their necks due to physical make-up (me included) , not due to any disability or injury, to do what you say you coach so how do you get round that problem?

Besides, if it works for you and you're repeating the same thing each time, where is the problem?
 

geoffretired

Supporter
Supporter
I like the article you linked to, TexARC.
I'm not so sure that it is always the coach's fault if an archer can't see past their glasses. In some cases it can be the glasses frame being too thick and too far forward from the face.
I have to wear sunglasses even in some cloudy conditions. I thought thin rimmed frames would be good, but not all seat the frame close in towards the the face and when the head is turned, appear further to the right than is good for vision.Also, some thin rims are bright metal and in sunshine, can cause reflections to distract, like having a bright light close to the eye.
Some sunglasses, with lenses that seem to be part of the frame( cyclists wear them) can fit so neatly round the nose that I am unaware of anything between my eye and the target, apart from the fact that I can relax rather than having my eyes screwed up.
 

lbp121

Member
I found that every year I saw less target and more nose. Then after some physio to free up the vertebra and allow movement in all the spine rather than in just a few areas, I saw more target and shot less well.
My physio suggested I was reliant on a stiff back rather then core strength to aim and shoot steadily.
It did take a while to get form back but tension in neck is not good so rotation should not be forced beyond comfortable. Once the draw is under way only small changes should be made ideally but relaxing muscles not actively invloved in the shot is surely a good thing?
 

peveka

New member
I've read this thread twice and I'm a little bit confused ...

First: what does "10 o'clock" mean? If you mean "more than 90? to one side" then you are a very mobile person. About 90? to one side (9 o'clock) would be quite normal. BUT: we in the "older" catagory do not have such mobility anymore (at leat physical ;) ). So the over 40 y-olds move only to about "half past 8". How to compensate? bear with me.
Second: when a person can't rotate enough he "tilts" his head by extending (moving backwards) his cervical spine and also compensates by rotating his thoracic spine, that's quite normal. What to do about that? Have your neck treated? Well, as long as nothing hurts I wouldn't. Let sleeping dogs lie. Over 40 it's normal to get a little stiffer. In your joints, that is.
Try to "stretch" your joints? Hm. That's an interesting concept and an item very much debated with us physios... If you want to stretch collagen (the stuff that makes up your ligaments and joint capsula) you have to "stretch your joints" about 10 times every hour. Stretch once and leave it for 24 hrs and you're back to where you began... frustrating ...
The thing about your prefered rotation direction is a bit of a tricky one. The official explanation is quite complicated: the rotation direction you prefer (be it neck, thoracic spine or lumbar) is dictated by the centre of gravity in your head, thorax or pelvis. You can't change that.
Try this: how do you hold a shovel? How do you clap your hands? How do you cross your arms? There is allways one way you prefer to do this, depending on the relevent positions of the centers of gravity and not with being right or left handed. Even the dominancy of your eyes depends on the center of gravity of your skull.. Nothing to do with how you sleep. You turn your head into a certain position BECAUSE it is you prefered rotation.

Right. Lesson to be learned?

KISS

If your neck rotation to one side isn't enough, simply adjust your position, i.e. the way you stand...

just my 2 cts ... well, make that 4 ;)

Greets,

Pieter


(physio, manipulative physio, teacher, archer, m.sc.phys.)
 

TexARC

Member
Um, perhaps in using poor verbal skills, I drew your attention to a lesser item, distracting from the gist of "don't put your eyeballs hard to port or starboard, but rather, as one sees in the owl, turn the entire head (sneaky allusion to your moniker<G>)...

I agree - the eyeball IS attached to muscles, which are responsible for eye movement; do they anchor into the neck or the ears?

I do not think those muscles are attached to the locations in the neck where one feels an influence from the eyeball in extremis. Certainly not in the same way that the triceps anchors into the upper torso/back of the body, which becomes a key influence in locking the ball of the humerus into the glenoid/shoulder assembly on the bow side. Tensing the tricep (with a properly vertical elbow) DOES "tug" at the body and draw the two parts together though I do not explicitly feel it happening. There is not, to my limited knowledge, an analogy to be made 'twixt the muscles controlling the eyeball and the nerves of the neck or ear ? But again, we talk about a small thing when the thought I failed to convey adequately (my apologies) is this: if you do not turn your head and face your prey when shooting a bow you cannot be as strong, as in control of your muscles, as if you did. Hope this heps.

How can this motion of the eyeball (which is completely isolated in the orbit) cause such sensations in a completely different place? It's neurological!

Correct me if I'm wrong but isnt the eye connected to the skull by 4 muscles.
If I am correct, then the eyeball is not isolated,if it was how would it move.
If I am wrong I bow to your greater anatomical knowledge :))
 

TexARC

Member
Geoff - good point, as I approach my "old geezerhood", I find my spine is not as accommodating of certain rotational motions, such as the abdominal coiling that couples with the open stance. One thing that I suggest to archers exploring just how good they can rotate, is to go into shooting position with a bungy bow or a string bow, turn the head normally as far as is comfortable, then, drop the chin down towards the chest by only an inch or so, and then see how much more you can turn your head. This tilting of the head downwards SLIGHTLY typically increases the range of motion by a noticeable degree.

I think it is a normal inclination <wink> to tilt the head back slightly away from the target in the "draw effort" especially in archers that do not use an angular draw, creating a self-limitation/early boundary in turning the head to the target.

I'm curious as to whether you find a slight change in ability to rotate with the experiment I suggested? (PS - when dropping the chin, maintain contact twixt upper and lower dentures<G> - don't just open mouth to drop chin!) I know of at least one archer that does that just to ping me. grin.... please do let me know?
 

TexARC

Member
...Straining to see the target is just setting up more tension in the neck which translates down to the shoulders and arms and then goes on to screw up the shot completely.
Stay relaxed and if you can see the target then you've done enough.
....Keep the head straight and level, Don't be tempted to twist at the waist to turn the shoulders, and let your eyes do what they're good at without killing yourself to get the shot!
If I understand - you are commending the square (aka closed) stance where the feet are parallel to the shooting line? If you have an open stance, I think that a small amount of coiling, tensing, the internal gut creates enhanced stability and a broader/lower center of gravity. You are certainly on the mark with the observation about undue tension - most "young" archers tense oppositional muscle groups that fight the desired motion. It's a firm reason why elite archers make it look so dang easy - they are not tensing the wrong groups of muscles that "fight" the efficient drawing muscles groups. Being relaxed mentally, while maintaining an intensity and focus, seems a contradiction but is not...
So there are some tensions that are good, but most of us tend to create, as you are saying(?) the wrong kinds of tension that impede good "flow" in a shot process.
 

TexARC

Member
Ok, So here's a question for this one... Not all archers have the same range of movement in their necks and some will NEVER have the range of motion in their necks due to physical make-up (me included) , not due to any disability or injury, to do what you say you coach so how do you get round that problem? Besides, if it works for you and you're repeating the same thing each time, where is the problem?
You are entirely correct - each of us has some differences that affect (in this case) turning to the target. I think it is interesting that anyone that shoots an arrow manages to turn ENOUGH to see the target. (They may have to stand face on to the target<G>).
I cannot help myself (that's my problem) in wanting to improve the sport (If I help an archer to be more successful then I improve the sport). Since I am convinced that many archers fail to face the target to the maximum possible manner, and likewise have been taught/convinced that putting the eyes into the corners of the sockets decreases strength and coordination, it's a simple progression that I follow to give myself the comfort of tilting at the windmill. It may *not* help you to be a better archer, but the testing of the advice is in the pudding, or some English phrase of the sort<G>...If you try it, and it does not give you benefit, you can happily pass, and if it does help, you can happily pass....either way, it's just a possible way to improve.
I work a lot with college kids - most total newbie archers - and I only offer input, as a cooperative style coach - rarely am I in the position of dictational coaching except in the case of potential physical injury/harm. Up here, absolutely suggestions mode. So if I post, HTH , that's all I am doing - hoping to help. Not saying there was a "problem", but that there is almost always a way to "better".
HTH.
 
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