episode 5 | posture

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Transcript:

We are going to look at the concept of how this all fits together and posture and alignment. When I work with clients, I work very much from front all the way to the back, and so we are going to kind of stick to that and if that is a little strange then forgive me.

We've talked about front hand position, we talked about that everything forward of this position is just going to be inert, definitely no 'push' forward. And so we are going to look at how that then fits together with what you are doing from the back and I make no apologies that this is my method. This is what having spent time throughout Europe and further afield [I've] put together - so, it may differ a little bit from what you have been told. The first part of any concept in alignment is what you are looking for to achieve this alignment, and we are going to talk in terms of (at the end [I've] give a little bit of a different spin on this), but for the rest of this, we are going to talk about [the] bow hand, [the] tab or release hand, and this rear elbow staying in line. So, you are going to form a line between these three. And this is going to take the emphasis off what some coaches work towards and what a lot of learners and intermediates get bogged down in, which is, “What am I going to do with this backend, what am I going to do to achieve some alignment?” And the alignment is going to come from sets of parallel lines.

If we keep these in line, you are going to end up with a position here where these three items are in line. You're going to end up with the position here, which is parallel to that line and if you like, parallel to the arrow, there is going to have to be a little bit of manipulation about what you do with the sort of angle between the arms and the shoulders, but what you are going to see is that is going to fit into a natural position. [The] basis of all alignment is posture and so to that end we need to momentarily have a look at that. Whether you are going to shoot with an open stance or a closed stance (and we will discuss the various merits of that at a later date), you are going to have to put the hips over the top of your ankles and this means that your feet are working as a flat platform with no bias towards the front or the back. The ankles are the center of where the weight sits, so the hips are going to sit over your ankles and form a stable positive basis.

The upper body is the heaviest part of your body and so immediately when we see people leaning backwards in this direction (putting an 'S' [shape] in their back), they are taking the heaviest part of the body and not actually putting it over the stable platform that they have made. So, we are going to talk in terms of the shoulders being a little bit forward, remove this 'S' [shape] in the back. The idea of standing up straight is somewhere in this position that is going to give you back problems and is actually very unstable. So, we are going to look at reducing that 'S' [shape] in your back, which is going to require these shoulders to be just a little bit forward of the center line, so we are looking for the shoulders to be over the laces of your shoes.

Weight balance: I deal with clients across Europe and some coaches are very interested in a very neutral balance and that is fine. They are looking for a very central line and to have a balance that definitely is not back of this position but also is not forward of this position. That is admirable and functional, however you are looking for (what we are going to talk about now) is a balance of weight that is probably 70% weight on the front end and 30% on the back. The reasons behind this are that it is easier to achieve a position - a physical position - if one has is away from a limit a balanced central position. So, the weight goes to the ankles, the hips stay over the ankles, little bit forward, and the weight a little bit towards the front foot. If you are looking for a way of measuring this, then you would be talking about being a little bit light on the back heel but you don't not need to worry too much about that and this does lead to a quick and useful test. If you stand with the feet together and lift one foot up off the floor, so we are just balancing on our front foot, this shoulder goes through a nice straight line here. If you were to go very far forward with the upper body, it becomes more difficult, similarly if you were to come back to this position, it becomes more difficult. So, when people say about where is the balance, you are looking for a simple concept in, if you just lift this foot off (the ground), and basically the weight is proportionately on the front foot (by definition as the back foot isn't touching the floor) but it is easily balanced, you can stay like this for a long time. So, what we are going to do with the upper body? You see a lot of novices, a lot of people further on than that, make this movement, they have to move, they feel they have to move this part of their body. This leads to huge problems with respect to a constant force, line of force in this direction but also translates through to aiming issues and translates through to shooting arrows high and low. So, we are looking for this position and we are looking for the balance across the body. And again, we have said that there is nothing forward here in the way of a push, so a good practice for this and just with a stretchy band, is a movement, you don't have to come back to and anchor point but you are looking for a movement that involves no losing of this position in this direction. It involves no push here and similarly as you see from this, this stays a little bit forward and actually gives you a bit of width on your shoulders - if you go back to here, we’re naturally starting from a position which is quite tight to start with. And that’s really all that I want to say about posture. You will see how that fits in with how you physically draw the bow and the movements that you make but like I said with the front hand, [it] is vitally important that you have this neutral balanced position on your body.