Gator Cup 2015

This was the briefest I ever remained at Gator Cup, mostly due to a mixture of inclement weather and 1001 other things I had to deal with, including school and taking preventative measure to protect what's left of my poor immune system. Full suite of pictures can be found here: http://s1281.photobucket.com/user/GuenhwyvarAnCrosaire/library/Gator%20Cup%202015

 The proprietor of Tasty Gators decided to catch a picture of me and the furry bear before Saturday's team competition began. 

 Paralympic archer Kinga Kiss-Johnson on target and ready to kill some 10 rings. She is one amazing warrior and towers above the rest of us!

 Lee Ford-Faherty preparing for some serious archery action and even more serious butt-kicking. I don't remember the name of the archer next to her, but she is also one heck of a warrior.

 Shooting line in action, including some of our amazing youth!

 Another view of the shooting line. This year wasn't a particularly good year for photography.

 Eew.  Just eew.  Some numbskull, I mean, football (probably American style) player dropped this on the field. We dare not touch it for fear of acquiring the brain-drain disease.

 Arrows... lots of arrows!

 Pincushions, anyone?

 My best end the entire weekend aside from a let-down gone very, very ugly.

 The next few pictures of me on the line are courtesy of one of the ultra-nice coaches who had no problems with pointing and clicking the camera for me.

 Me and Lee Ford-Faherty with her awesome little scooter! She is one of my greatest heroes in the archery world with her tenacity!She probably knocks more sense into my head than most others!

 I now have two stickers on my case so I can recognize it better!

 Team round preparation.  This is NOT very pretty.  Candy and I did some structural damage to the target butt.  At least mine came out without *too* much trouble.

 The next series of pictures are courtesy of the furry bear, although I know he had a difficult time photographing us because of all the people moving in/out and everywhere.

 Team Florida Stars! We took 4th in the senior women's recurve team match but we had an amazing blast! Nothing like three archers of different backgrounds teaming up and kicking butt! We even had a former Ukranian Olympian with us (on the far right). 

 Two of my favorite male recurve archers... one Canadian Olympian and one UF archer who has gone from an awkward engineering student to one heck of an archer. 

 The next series of pictures are courtesy of a compound shooter who happened to be in the vicinity and was not afraid to handle my camera. I got eliminated 6-2 by my young opponent but it was still a lot of fun aside from the downpour and thunder!

 And here I am with my good friend C. Balusek of Georgia Tech. He's like me - went from barebow to Olympic recurve and got hooked on it. He was the lone wolf from his school but he made it down!

 Practice end for team round... I think I needed to adjust things a bit.

And this looks a little better... although that first arrow was NOT pretty!

In the Shadow of the Monstro-Murk

There's not too many other colorful and accurate ways to describe threatening storm clouds besides bringing up a Rainbow Brite allusion...

 This is my warm-up target for blank-baling. This thing is one of my best friends to help me reinforce better habits when I shoot and cool down after practice. I need to install one of these at home!

 My first sighted-in end ... well... part of one at any rate. The first three arrows were off the target butt. I didn't realize how far I had to move my sight in this 20-40 km/hr wind!

 Not too shabby for being blown around like a rag doll and having to let down my shot several times! So glad I got to shoot with fellow recurve archers who understand that some of us need to let down our shots periodically!

 This was another pretty darned good group once the winds really, really picked up.

And there's the Monstro-Murk threatening to rain down upon us!

Indoor Progress

Being focused really makes life a lot easier! I still let down a lot of shots because something didn't quite go right during the set-up, which is generally a more "defensive" portion of the shot.

Making of a Laminated Recurve (Guest Entry)

This is the story of how a laminated recurve gets built. This entry is by the Bear (well... kinda) - he gave me the notes and pictures to put on this site.

 These are the sapele wood veneers that will go into the limbs.

 This is another view of the veneers that will be used on the limbs. 

The form for the bow is ready to be loaded up.

 

The riser is being sanded down to specs. 

Mixing two part epoxy to glue the laminations together. This will also need some time to cure.

The parts have been glued up with the epoxy, layer by layer, in the form. It's now time to stick this thing into the oven to help cure the epoxy!

 

 This is the inside of the home-made bow oven. It's got aluminum foil, light bulbs, thermometer, and timer.

 The bow is out of the oven and has been removed from the form. There's a lot of extra glue that needs to be sanded off. Better to have more glue than too little!

 See the grids? Those are used for reference in sanding the limbs. The limbs are being sanded to the outermost lines.

 Sanding in progress. Notice the tapering in the limbs and the continued presence of the grid..

 And there's still more sanding! There is a fair amount of precision involved here!

 Once the limbs are sanded, it's time to shape the riser.

 The laminated pile of wood and fiberglass is starting to look like a bow!

 The limb tips are being glued on. This involves multiple layers of material all glued together and clamped down to keep things from slipping loose. This bow will be able to use Fast Flight and similar materials as well as the old-school Dacron B-50.

Time to glue on the riser overlay, which is both for aesthetics and strength. 

 The string grooves in the limb tips are being cut with a chain-saw file. Again, note the use of the grid.

The string grooves still need to be precisely shaped in after being approximately cut in with the chain-saw file. 

 Once approximately cut in, the string grooves refined and the tips can be shaped.

 The riser gets cut in with a carbide blade band saw. This is the initial set of cuts to get the approximate shape.

 The finer details of the riser shape are generated via sanding. Lots of sanding.

 After tillering the limbs (adjusting limb strength relative to each other), the grooves in the back of the limbs get cut in with a file.

 It's getting close to done. Just a few more steps to go.

 The sanding just never ends. This needs another round of sanding to handle imperfections and to make sure everything is precisely shaped.

It's time to spray finish the bow. This is what gives the bow its luster as well as sealing the wood and other materials from moisture.

 Finished up bow, all finished and ready to shoot. It's time to tune it!

 Dale Karch of 3Rivers Archery is test-shooting the bow. He gives a royal thumbs-up!

The bear has nailed a squirrel with a pink-fletched arrow.

And that was the story of how a laminated recurve gets built in a little shed somewhere in the middle of nowhere gluteal crack of Florida!