After the traditional torrential rain of (what would have been) Senior Race Day, the weather gods relented and blessed the island with a gloriously hot weekend. Shooting conditions were perfect on Sunday at Greeba and gave the archers a chance to work on both their form and their suntans.
Barbara Harris, having misjudged how hot it would be at 9 am, had to dispense with her undershirt after the first six arrows. Joy Gough was glad she was wearing shorts, and Barbara Harris was glad that Rhys Moore was not, as she finds the glare from his preternaturally white legs off-putting. They were joined by Alex Snell in an unofficial Short Metric round (50 & 30m) just to see if they could get through the required number of arrows (12 sighters + 72 arrows for the round itself). About 18 arrows from the end the loss of ‘match fitness’ became obvious as they all ran out of steam. Will power saw them to the end but their form became increasingly ragged. Rhys and Barbara kept a note of their scores on their phones for their own benefit and both were encouraged by the results. Joy did not keep score and used the session as a way of ‘opening her shoulders’. Alex Snell enjoyed the weather more than the shooting and concluded that he was ‘overthinking the shot’.
The second session brought higher temperatures and higher tempers with the arrival of Billy Lightfoot and Danny Cowin. Billy brought plenty of enthusiasm with him but no water. He spent the session tinkering with his latest bow between ends until he was ‘banging them in’ with ease. The groups were so close in fact that he started to damage his arrows. Unfortunately, as fatigue set in his accuracy left and Billy being Billy blamed it on the bow. His dissatisfaction was such that he declared he would be switching back to old PSE bow for the next session.
All Danny Cowin brought with him was a hangover. To be fair to Mr Cowin he did manage to complete an unofficial Short Metric in between complaining about the heat. His 50m distance was dismal, but a slight change to his set up on the shot at 30m produced a marked improvement in his form if not his temper.
Toby Young spent the session with his personal trainer, Charlotte Harris, ironing out a few kinks he picked up during lockdown.
The new rules effecting sports clubs which came into effect on the 15th of June means that Sunday 21st will see the resumption of competitive archery at Greeba in the form of a WA 720 round.
Isle of Man Archery Club 