• From: SoCal
  • Registered: 2015-08-12
  • Posts: 319
  • User Karma: 15

Topic: torque again - is it universal in Korean archery?

Do all good gungsa(?) shoot with some tension on the wrist to torque the handle away from the arrow? I've been trying to do without that

I saw a video of some senior archers shooting, I think in the snow, who seemed to not move the bow at all upon release.

Also, should the bow hand wrist be relaxed?

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  • Registered: 2010-10-15
  • Posts: 860
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Re: torque again - is it universal in Korean archery?

I've seen all types of releases by all levels of archers.  Some give the torque, while other don't; some cant their bows, while others are perpendicular to the ground.  Personally, I was taught by a 명궁 (myeonggung/master archer) to do the torque twist, along with a slight dip of the upper limb upon release.  In the end, I would say try everything, and go with what works best for you.

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  • Registered: 2016-10-26
  • Posts: 1
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Re: torque again - is it universal in Korean archery?

In my opinion, it really depends on what type of shooting you want to do. Long distance shooting, it should not matter much. Your arrows have enough time to adjust in flight. Short or very short distance shooting is entirely different story. I recently did a lot of competition shooting against traditional western archer. The 3D courses for traditional bow shooter usually setup with a lot of obstacles between you and the target forcing you to shoot from all kind of awkward positions. There always seem to be bushes between you and the target. Lots of the time, you have to shoot through very narrow gap between two trees. The stability of your arrows mean everything in those situation. A good western traditional shooter with a center cut recurve or long bow can tune their bow and arrow so that the arrow flight very straight right off the bow. A korean bow shooter like myself have to depends a lot on technique to get a good arrow clearance. Plus I currently shoot with vanes, so it wasn't easy.

If you shoot with vanes, you really need to get a good torque technique or your arrows will fish-tail like crazy. Shooting in a field 3D archery course and you will get a tons of defections. Tree branches will be out to get you, lol.

But then again, shooting at target 40-50m again won't be such problematic.

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