Q: Is head position important when shooting?

A:

Head position is integral to good posture. Remember that your head will fit in and you have an almost infinite amount of control over its movement. You will see novice and intermediate archers altering their full draw position, hunching their shoulders and having “nothing to shoot the shot off” purely because they have forced their head into an unnatural position.

So often you see archers forcing parts of their anatomy into position before they begin to draw the bow and this is especially true for head position. It is nearly impossible to get this position right from a static position. This is due to the large amount of sensory information which is delivered from the neck and shoulders and is difficult to process due to the lack of visual information available to the archer. So the individual often feels that a position is “straight” when it is not due to the body associating information with poor proprioception.

1492262_719584061453420_2864159866675950277_oIt is easy to see if an archer has a problem with head position as they will struggle to achieve a consistent position without associated cues. A coach should watch and compare the archers head position during “normal” shooting and aiming and with closed eyes blank boss shooting. If there is a difference in head position the archer is using associated cues such as string position and sight position to affect their head position.
The important thing to remember is to allow the shoulders to stay down, the head to remain centrally located above the shoulders and in a “natural” position.

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