Author: ntechmedia

Beautiful sunny weather greeted archers to the Qld State Series shoot at Hinterland on 2nd & 3rd July. Cool mornings but bright sunny skies created a challenging environment amongst the dark shadows of the virgin bush & scrub areas of the newly formed ranges.

The committee did a great job in providing a welcoming atmosphere to the visitors although numbers were down on last year thanks to our federal politicians calling for a vote on the same day…..can’t trust ‘em I say!!

Everyone appreciates the work carried out by the committee & members in preparing the course over several weeks leading up to the sanctioned shoot, so we hope to see more visitors to this wonderful part of Queensland in the future.

Good shooting and have fun out there!!

Casino is a ‘not so small’ town of around 10000 people situated on the banks of the Richmond River. A few kilometres to the south of Casino is the club of the Northern Rivers Field Archers, who hold the State of Origin each year. At the annual State of Origin, NSW and QLD face-off in a fierce battle to determine who is the superior state.

Held on the long weekend of June, the State of Origin is classed as a national event, and it is the second event to be held by the Northern Rivers Field Archers in 2016. Being a national event, makes it a ‘must go’ on the shoot calendar for many archers. Again, this year the State of Origin did not disappoint, drawing over 180 shooters eager to prove their state the better.

The grounds of the Northern Rivers Field Archers are open with scattered patches of dense bushland. Small, rolling hills provide plentiful dead ground, something the range setters made full use of. The week before, small creeks had broken their banks due to the extreme weather, rendering previously set courses damaged beyond use. However, the quickly-set ranges still did not disappoint.

Saturday morning was cooler than some expected, with many choosing to linger by their campfires and make their way onto the ranges later in the morning. The day warmed up slowly, but remained clear, making for excellent shooting weather. The hours went by at a leisurely pace, with most archers choosing to take the scenic route and shoot the ranges furthest from camp.

Sunday began clear and warm. However, many still took their time at making it out onto range. As the day moved on, the weather began to threaten rain. However, to the relief of many archers, this never eventuated. The wind did pick up as the day moved on, making for even more challenging open shots for those who had decided on a later start. As always, a fair number of arrows went for a dip in the water, with those recovered being handed out to their grateful owners when everyone gathered together for the main event of the weekend – the traditional NSW vs QLD shoot-off.

Coming into the shoot-off on Sunday afternoon, NSW held a convincing lead. Unfortunately, QLD did not have the numbers for the unaided shoot-off, with a team of only four, but they fared better in the aided shoot-off. This was still to no avail, as NSW powered home, winning the State of Origin. Again. Congratulations, NSW, for a battle well fought – and to QLD, too, for their valiant attempt. We look forward to meeting you on the battlefield again next year.

The range setters definitely did not win this battle, however, with a total of 18 perfect rounds being shot, as well as three double perfects. An equally impressive eight records were also set with some of these magnificent scores. The ranges setters still need to be congratulated for their fantastic work in such little time. Many people found the ranges quite fun, making for an enjoyable weekend.

A special congratulations also to David Unwin, who celebrated his 50^th birthday over the long weekend. Happy Birthday, Dave.

The efforts of the Northern Rivers Field Archers are much appreciated for their great work, especially in such a short amount of time. Hopefully the weather is kinder next year.

The next shoot on the 3DAAA calendar is being held by Hinterland on the weekend of the 2^nd and 3^rd July, this being the 2^nd QLD shoot for 2016 we think it will be well attended. The next NSW shoot on the 3DAAA calendar is Gunnedah Arrow Slingers. This will be the first sanctioned shoot held by the club, and we are assured that it will be a great event for all. It will be held on the weekend of the 9^th and 10^th July. Also that weekend Victoria have their State Titles being held at DVA.

– hope to see you all there.

“A good archer is not known by his arrows, but his aim.” – English Proverb

It was the 21^st May, 2016, and the archery community gathered from far and wide to compete at the Lake Macquarie Classic 2016.

Lake Macquarie Field Archers hosted this two day 3DAAA State Series event at their club grounds at Wakefield, NSW. The club grounds consist of 46 hectares of undulating, wooded archery terrain which form part of the Sugarloaf State Conservation Area, lying just to the West of Lake Macquarie.

This year’s Indian Summer weather held out to present near perfect conditions for the weekend: a little overcast cloud early on the Saturday clearing to crystal clear blue skies on the Sunday, with mid 20 degree temperatures and hardly a breath of wind throughout.

The weeks leading up to the event saw a small but dedicated team working tirelessly to prepare five of the most challenging of ranges, led by our mentor and grand master, Simeon “Simo” Weir.  Simo insists that he’s not a mean person, but the glint in his eye when anyone mentions the less than kindly placement of the turkey way out there in the darkest of black tunnels on range C may suggest otherwise. I think that all attendees at the event will agree that we must express a huge debt of gratitude to Simo for creating a set of top class ranges that tested us all, both mentally and physically.

Overall, 148 archers registered to shoot which was a pleasing turnout, on par with attendance at last year’s event.

There was a large contingent of campers enjoying the hospitality of the Lake Macquarie club, who were all kept well fuelled by Sharyn Dick and her tireless team of helpers in the canteen.

“In archery we have something like the way of the superior man. When the archer misses the centre of the target, he turns round and seeks for the cause of his failure in himself.” –  Confucius

“photos courtesy of Spellbound Photography (Donna Gilroy).”

The second NSW shoot for 2016 was held by the Lake Glenbawn Field Archers at the Inland Waters Holiday Park, Lake Glenbawn, a fantastic place for a camping holiday. Located not far from the small country town of Scone, Lake Glenbawn was a much shorter drive for many NSW shooters than Bonalbo.

The club grounds are located on the eastern side of the lake, where the terrain gets progressively steeper, making it a great area for challenging hill shots – which the club delivered. The camping at the club grounds was minimal, but being a holiday park there were plenty of great camping spots available elsewhere. Many shooters chose to camp down by the Lake, where beautiful views are on offer.

The ranges were all set in the hills surrounding the club grounds, which made for some good walking. The bushland around the club varies from dense scrub to sparse trees, allowing a diverse and challenging mixture of shots. The ranges were well set and that perfect score eluded many. A small win for Glenbawn’s range setters.

Saturday began brisk, but many still headed out early to avoid the heat that would come later in the day. The skies were clear and the sun bright, making for a fantastic day, but making shots in heavily shaded areas difficult.

Come the Top-Ten later that Saturday, the sun was in full shine, making for great background lighting. A Top-Ten was held for the sighted shooters behind the club house, the targets positioned high on the hill above. It lasted several rounds, with young Jake Collins at last emerging victorious.

Sunday started out much warmer than Saturday, with a few less shooters choosing to make the early start. Many probably wished they had as the day got progressively hotter. However, an increase in temperature didn’t lessen people’s scores, nor did it detract from the top quality of the ranges.

Even though there weren’t many perfect scores shot, the results were still impressive. Congratulations should go to Simon Gallen and Matt Bradshaw, who achieved perfects despite the range setter’s best attempts. A second congratulations should also go to Matt for again managing to equal the highest Sunday score for his division.

Yet again the Lake Glenbawn club has put on another fantastic event that many enjoyed, and their efforts are greatly appreciated. The next NSW shoot on the 3DAAA calendar is Lake Macquarie Field Archers on the 21^st and 22^nd of May.

MPB first 3DAAA event this year

Previous weeks in lead up to our Shoot a number of works a had been completed to the club grounds, Including a fresh coat of paint to the entire club house and storage facilities as well as some new roofing and fences put in place.

The Entire grounds and course where mowed and a number of downed trees where cut and cleared

Most importantly we replenished our entire practice range from some old target butts kindly donated to us from Sherbrook archers, after a little bit of refurbishment our practice rang once again look great, Non could of been achieved without a number of hard working members who came and donated their time to support our club.

The 3 courses where set on the Friday with the help of a number of Club members.

The club had just recently purchased some new targets so we took the opportunity to place them with a lot of thought , we like to make sure our course are challenging and unique making use of shadowy spots and crested knolls for tricky shots. There’s Nothing better than hearing reports of how a top shooter fudged a few of the targets..

Friday afternoon as we had just finished setting the course and going through some finale grounds upkeep we where graced by the presence of a few 3DAAA Top brass.

Mike, Rob & Ron Had made the effort to come down for our shoot, it was great to see the support from national.

The afternoon also saw a number of shooters roll in and make use of our camping facilities.

Saturday

The shooting Ran Smoothly as expected All shooters where on the course by 9am Most competitors had made it back in and handed over score sheets by 1pm, they were welcomed by our canteen running full steam to supply them with a hearty feed. Including a selection of baked goods kindly donated to the club, by one of our members

As always the members behind the counter did an amazing job of feeding the competitors.

By this stage I was starting to hear reports of missed targets, This would usually puts a smile on my face, however the Target in question, I also missed.

Saturday night the club had the bonfire cranking and the usual crowd of campers gathered around, we organized a bulk order of pizza for dinner, That always seems to keep people happy.

Sunday

With the courses being changed around, more opportunity for a few new tricky shots arose.

Once again the shooting ran smoothly, scores were collected and presentations went on without a hitch, a number of the club members took home some trophies as well as some junior members winning a voucher from the 3DAAA sponsors. (the kids where extremely happy with that)

A lot of time and effort went into the preperati0on of this event, So it was great to hear nothing but praise from the competitors.

It was a pleasure hosting the 3DAAA Shoot.

The second shoot for the Victorian series was hosted by Twin City Archers Gippsland at Morwell last weekend, 19^th & 20^th March 2016.

After much debate about moving the event to stop conflict with other events being run in Victoria on the same weekend and several club members being away hunting, the decision was made to go ahead with the scheduled date.

With the help of club members and volunteers on the weekend before and during the week leading up to the shoot, the courses were set out ready to challenge those that entered the shoot.

The bush area, although flat, provided some tricky tunnel shots through trees and plenty of dead ground with long grass and low bushes to get the archers thinking about the distance to the target. The elevated stand in this area was also put into good use with two shots at different angles and distances proving to be a real challenge for some.

Out in the open field area the hills and mounds also kept the archers focused to try and make the right shot. This area provided some great long shots, made a bit tougher with a breeze coming up in the afternoon. The steep downhill to the front on turkey showed they don’t have to be long shot to be difficult and this sorted a few out.

The courses were reset in the afternoon for the second days shoot, with those involved thinking they had made it quite a bit tougher. Dale Walton, winner of the MBO division, wasn’t deterred having a great Sunday scoring 100 on the second course. Well done to him.

All divisions were well contested with the MSR 1^st and 2^nd places being decided on a count back of 10s with Cordell McGuire taking the honour with 30 to 27.

Twin City Archers would once again like to thank all those that helped, participated and supported the shoot and hope that you come back again in August for another weekend of shooting arrows and enjoying good company.

Hope to see you at the next Victorian series shoot on 9^th & 10^th April 2016 at Mornington Peninsula Bowmen, Cape Schanck.

The first NSW shoot of 2016 was held in the quiet country town of Bonalbo, near the NSW-QLD border, hosted by the Northern Rivers Field Archers. It was a long drive for many NSW archers, but we still managed a respectable turnout for the first shoot of the year with 111 shooters.

This was the first sanctioned shoot held at Bonalbo, and with a mixture of hills and open fields, the area lent itself well to the event. The camping was at the Bonalbo showground, where the very first Australian cattle dog trials were held in 1950. The showground was an ideal site for camping with plenty of room for all our archers, a great canteen run by the locals, and ample space for the practice range in the corral, surrounded by fantastic views of the Bonalbo countryside.

The ranges were set out on the farmland surrounding the showground, where the land was lightly wooded with moderately steep terrain. This allowed the Northern Rivers range setters to set out their long open shots, with the addition of inclines making for exceptional ranges. This provided a good mixture of difficulty for all skill levels and archery disciplines.

Saturday began with a quite heavy fog, which deterred many from an early start to their day. The fog didn’t fully clear until mid-morning, at which point the temperature began to climb and the humidity set in. Although it was cooler in Bonalbo than in lower NSW, the NSW shooters didn’t appreciate the high humidity, particularly when making the trek up the steep hill where the majority of ranges began.

By the time the Top-Ten was held on Saturday the humidity had dropped making for a more comfortable climate. The Top-Ten was held in an unconventional style, where aided shooters were paired with unaided shooters in teams of two. The teams then shot against each other, with a total combined score for each team. The winning team was comprised of Geoff Mercer and Lachlan Donnelly.

On Sunday the humidity reached 100%; this was believed to be due to the rain, which continued on and off through the day. This made for some slippery tracks in steeper areas, but did not seem to detract from overall scores, nor did it dampen spirits. However, many did not appreciate the return to saturated camping gear afterwards.

There were some amazing results posted, including nine new records, ten perfect rounds, two double perfects, as well as a triple perfect and a perfect ‘500’ shot by young Matt Bradshaw in YMR13-14. It seems that the range setters lost this battle.

In conclusion, this shoot made for a fantastic start to the NSW shoot calendar and I’m sure many shooters would be happy to return to the town of Bonalbo for another sanctioned event. The next shoot on the NSW 3DAAA calendar is Lake Glenbawn being held on the 16^th and 17^th of April.

This is always a busy time of year, the planning was in place and the courses planned on paper as the days moved closer paper plans moved to actual setting of the courses and the walk throughs.

The day arrived all too soon and in a very short time the members were turning up excited about the event ahead, the weather put on its finest and sunshine and blue skies created an expectation of some good shooting.

Saturday saw the archers take to the range early after a few spot checks were done, our course is set across a gully and the ranges are set across this landscape which creates interesting shot placement, even close targets can be deceptive.

The local wild life presented itself as two very friendly ducks did some fine tuning to bows as we entered the course, kangaroos sat in the shade as spectators and watched with amusement as we moved through the ranges.

While the cubs enjoyed the challenge, the course was certainly a long one for them, but a credit to them all, they shot all 30 targets.

Shot placement was the key as we did not want to max out ranges, and even experienced archers realised they could miss the 10 on relatively close targets that appeared to be too far or at times too close.

The feeding deer in the creek bed with the archer taking the shot from uphill and through a window created naturally from natural flora in the area made some think twice as they placed themselves for the shot.

Moving down the course saw the tree stand shot, a bedded ram ((white) this meant balance and concentration was a must, a few more points gained and lost on this one.

Now for the crocodile set across the creek bed shot from uphill, that made the shot look like it was at max, but was it? Most felt a sense of relief if they heard the familiar thump of a target being hit, others saw / heard their arrows to their surprise sail over its back and into the bank at the back.

The last few targets we could hear the immortalised words of “I think I’ll go home now” come across to keep the humour up as we moved across the ranges.

Day one saw archers return to the club house for lunch and refreshments reflect on their scores and plan for day two.

The DVA team was already heading out after a quick lunch to relay the ranges for the next 20 targets with a mixture of duties the team is working on different tasks at different targets, and this makes for the different shots we get across this challenging terrain.

Tammy and Adam have a bet going on who gets the better score on the Saturday and they then have to do something different – well this week end Adam lost (again) last time it was to wear a tutu (pink) for the Sunday event, this one a nappy – well it all part of the fun, but is hard to concentrate when you are trying to give archers directions to on and off the courses and have an archer in nappies standing there – entertainment plus – not sure what will take place at the next event?

Sunday saw another great day for 3D Archery, slight breeze and a slightly overcast day that meant temperatures were in the mid- 20s, a quick look over the course and we were ready to go.

By 9:00am the ranges were again a buzz with archers as they made their way to the ranges, some still remembering the walk the previous day had done to test their stamina.

The new ranges had changed targets pegs and distances or were they? The Turkey now under 10 meters saw archers rechecking their ability to shoot at this distance, some cheered some gave the Turkey colourful new names.

The leopard in the creek bed created shadows and spots that had archers seeing a few more spots than were not on the leopard. As with each target there were once again moment of surprise and relief as archers took on the challenge of the ranges and the targets set out by the range setters.

3D Archery, while creating an atmosphere of competition it also creates one where great discussions take place across the ranges. This can be seen as archers joke with one another from target to target, and discuss all manner of things, new shoots coming up past one and their current shooting.

All too soon just as quickly as the events date came it was now becoming a passing event as we gathered for presentations.

As the event draws to a close discussions had already started on where the next event is to take place and how archers will meet there again.

A thankyou to the Diamond Valley Archers team that planned and set the event up, and a as always a thankyou to all the competitors that turned up to make this an enjoyable event.

Look forward to seeing you all at the Twin Cities Archers event 19^th & 20^th of March 2016