I became an archery tragic when I turned 48. My only regret is that I didn’t start shooting arrows when I was a child. I love every little aspect of the noble art of toxophily (the fancy word for archery) and do everything I can to increase my knowledge and skill.

My passion is for field archery, which involves walking around bushland, paddocks, etc. shooting various size target faces at various distances. My chosen division is ‘Barebow Recurve’, which allows for space age materials but strips the bow itself back to nothing but the riser (‘handle’), the limbs and a string. No stabilisers, no sights, no dampening devices. The only simpler version of archery is the wooden longbow, which I also shoot ocasionally.

Archery is as much a discipline as it is a sport. Like most sports, it is not as simple as it looks, requiring endless learning, concentration, breath control, hand/eye coordination, some level of strength and a great deal of patience…

I’ve come a long way since I first picked up a beginner’s bow to the point where I am a competent and competitive barebow archer, I build my own arrows, make my own strings and help others to find their way into this historic and iconic sport.

Over the years I have managed to shoot a number of ‘All Perfect’ targets. ‘All Perfects’ are where all of your arrows in a scoring ‘end’ are shot into the centre-most scoring circle of the target (which most people would recognise as a ‘bullseye’):

• In field archery an All Perfect is all three arrows in the 6 ring.
• In target archery an All Perfect is all six arrows in the X/10 ring.

Some of my All Perfects include: