Gap Aiming

[Draco]

Billy, I hope you didn't take any thing I said as negative toward you at all. I know that when I met you at Bob's that you were just totally enthralled with sticks and strings. Besides that you are just a good ol' boy and i just wanted you to succeed with the stick bow that I know you love. If this doesn't work then go to the other bow and try it again next year. If you get it down then you won't have a problem sticking a deer, I gaurantee it.

[BmacBmac1]

Bob,

Thank you for taking the time to put this together and post it. I will give it a try and see what happens.

I am really glad you posted tonight. I shot this evening and though I did not shoot terrible, after missing the target twice and loosing an arrow (I HATE TO LOOSE ARROWS!), I just hung the bow up for the evening.

I am likely goin over to Ol Mans in the AM and maybe I can try your suggestion in the morning.

Again, Thanks for the post.

Bill

[Deb]

I can tell that if I could learn to do that it would increase my accuracy 10%. It still seems like a lot of thinking, and it involves numbers.....I hate numbers and can't understand them at all unless they involve green and presidents.

[Draco]

Yes ma'am it will. But I don't think you need to change. I've heard that you shoot plenty good all ready and that was from some one who knows good.

[Draco]

What all this tells us is that from very close range to thirty yds. we are only dealing with 12" of error in elevation. There is really no range estimation needed. If a deer comes in close, under fifteen, just hold it about a foot low of it's heart [right on it's front knee for me] and you got him. If it's not so close, more medium range, say fifteen to a little over twenty, just hold it six to eight or so inches low and bust him. If it is starting to look like a long shot then put it point on and if it looks like a really long shot put the point on it's back. You probably don't want to start taking those long shots for a few years but you will becuase with this method you will get that good.

I hope some of this helped. I have taught some to shoot this way that have killed their first deer only a few months after picking up a bow, it's just that easy to learn. However while easy to learn you will fine tune the system to fit your self even better.

[Deb]

Draco, your anchor and head position are exactly like mine. Will this method of shooting work with a canted bow?

[Draco]

Next comes 40 yds. and that is as far as we need to go for most hunting situations.

First is holding right on the + and of course it is low. Shoot a second to make sure.

Next shoot holding the same distance, about a foot, high as we were low and a second to be sure.

[Draco]

Next comes thirty. I always shoot best at thirty as I am point on at thirty. But we don't know that yet and we have to find our point on. Here's thirty and I'll be darned I am point on there. From now on our point will be above the + to hit right.

[Draco]

Next I move back to 20 yds.. I shoot an arrow with the point right on the big + again. I shoot a second to make sure.

In the second picture I have adjusted my aim and hold the point where the tip of my bow limb is. Now I have the gap at twenty. 15 yds. will be right between the the ten and twenty gaps. I told you I wasn't shooting all that good.

[Draco]

My bow is a 63# Pronghorn, shooting 2213 al. arrows and total arrow weight is 610 gr. The bow shoots these at 178 fps. I am going to shoot these just like I have some one do when teaching them. My shooting may not be too good as I have not shot since Oct. 10th. when I killed a buck.

I am starting at 10 yds. and I put the point of the arrow right on the big + sign and shoot. I shoot a second arrow to make sure.

The second picture is after shooting an arrow while holding the point the same distance low as the first shots were high. The arrow standing up has it's point on where I held the point at. This tells me where my 10 yd. gap is, about 12" low.

[Draco]

While I shot instinctive for about 35 years, I had to change about 12 yrs. ago due to an inability to get my instincts to work right. I don't know what happened, maybe several eye surgeries had something to do with it. I shot NFAA archery for quite a few years in bowhunter division. I developed a gap system to aim and used the bow to gap off of. It worked quite well but only worked with the bow held vertically.

Knowing that it wouldn't work well for hunting I started to read as much as I could on other peoples gap system. It seemed gapping off the point was the way to go, however if I hadn't already used a type of gapping in the past I wouldn't have been able to do it as no ones explanation was very good.
I've taught several people to shoot using the gap in the last few years and have found a better way to explain it. I personally believe it is a superior way to shoot and has several advantages over other methods if you shoot 3 under. If you don't then there is too much distance between your eye and the arrow which would make the gaps just too large.

Here is the way I teach people to shoot the gap. You start with the target and you draw your own. It has a big plus sign with dashes every four inches above and below the plus. Here it is. The first picture is the target and the second is a close up of me shooting to show where my anchor is. It looks like my left eye is closed but it's not, the sun was bright from that direction.