Right eye funny, left eye deadly

Tonight I went to an archery range in Palo Alto with some friends for Sarah's birthday. Well, it was Sarah's birthday, but whether we went to the archery range because it was Sarah's birthday is unkown to me. Correlation does not imply cuasation.

Anyway, I was excited to learn how to shoot a bow and arrow because I still harbor some secret dreams that deep in my subconscious lies a natural, highly efficient killing machine that will show itself when given the chance. Part of that dream is that after demonstrating my natural ability I'm abducted by the government and put into some super secret military program (similar to Weapon X, or Super Soldier) where they inject me with medication that not only cures my Crohn's disease but also has all the benefits of steroids without any of the side effects. But I'd never admit that dream/fantasy to anyone because they'd think I'm crazy. So just pretend I didn't write that.

The instructor was a really nice guy, very down to Earth and obviously and avid archer, he was really glad to talk about it with us. So before we started we were introduced to the equipment, everyone who's left handed raise your hand so you can be ostracized (it's like that in every sport/activity). However, this question presented an unusual challenge for me. I was born right handed, write with my right, throw a baseball with my right, shoot a basketball with my right, but learned to be quasi-ambidextrous playing lacrosse and shoot a gun (air rifle) left handed. So I nervously asked for assistance in determining which hand I should be when shooting a bow and arrow.

The instructor had an interesting solution. He had my form a small triangle by overlapping my hands and then asked me to look through it and focus on his hand. Then he asked me to slowly pull my hands back closer to my face. While I was pulling my hands back he announced that I was left eye dominant and therefore, for the purposes of shooting a bow and arrow, left handed. Mom would be so proud. I still don't actually know what he was looking for that told him that but was fine with his diagnosis. So I loaded up the wrist guard on my right arm and took hold of the left handed bow as we walked up to the first firing line, 5 yards from the wall of targets.

It was at this point that he instructed us on the proper foot placement, how to load the arrow onto the bow, grip the firing string and in the end, fire. At first it was a bit uncomfortable using my left hand to pull back and fire, but after firing a few off my body adjusted. The first couple of rounds my arrows were clumping fairly well, however usually in the blue ring (yellow center, red just outside of that, blue outside of that, black outside of that, white outside of that) of the target. After we got comfortable our instructor asked us to fire at the lower targets on the wall, so that he could guide us on where we should be aiming in order to the targets dead on. From my shots he suggested that I concentrate on keeping my back elbow raised (a constant problem which has plauged me throughout baseball/softball seasons) and aim for the bottom of the black section of my target.

I stepped back to the line and implemented the instructor's suggestions. Whish, whish, whish, whish - 3 reds and a yellow. Sweet. Another round from this distance - 2 reds and 2 yellows, and the 2 yellows were parallel to each other, which was a goal I set for myself for the simple fact that it seemed cool.

After that we were ready to move back to the 10 yard line. My first round wasn't as successful as the new distance requires some aiming calibration. Midway through my second round I figured where I needed to aim and it was back to Robin Hood like accuracy. After a few more rounds, we moved back to 15 yards. Again, after a little calibration I was back to hitting yellow like uhm, something that hits yellow frequently.

I was feeling pretty good until we moved back to 20 yards. I kept trying to make my adjustment but couldn't get closer than the blue circle. Of course by this point though the whole yellow section looks like the size of a dime. I also felt my form wasn't as correct as it had been previously, either due to the amount of shots I had fired and an inability to repeat the same motion consistently (see my bowling game) or a combination of the distance and the size of my arrows (I was using longer and heavier ones that the rest of my friends).

In the end I had a great time, and feel really good about my bow sniping ability from inside of 20 yards. While I'm not going to go rushing headlong (Queen reference) into this as a new hobby, I definitely think it's an activity I'll do again. Although, I still would like to go to a firing range and squeeze off a few rounds.

Hey, if you're going to be the military's new super soldier you've got to be well versed in all types of weaponry.