May has seen a number of outdoor competitions for archers to compete in and one South Wansdyke Archery Club member has embraced this fact.  Clair Crook has been traveling the country with her Compound bow and representing the club with aplomb and not a little success!  First up a trip Bedfordshire to compete at Kestrel Archers to shoot a classic “Hereford” round.  She claimed a bronze medal, a personal best (PB) and is also able to claim an Archery GB (AGB) award for completing a 6 gold end at the 80 yard distance.  A week later she was in Exmouth for a “double WA50”, another bronze medal, 2 PBs and an AGB black target award for a score above 550.  A double header followed in Redruth, another “Hereford”, winning a gold medal and gaining an AGB red rose award for a score above 1100 and a “double WA50” beating her PB from a week ago and picking up the silver medal.  Finally, the tour ended at Burnham Archers for a final “Hereford” picking up a gold medal and a further personal best. Well Done Clair 🙂

May was also the month for Archery GBs celebration of Archery and their established “Start Archery” week.  On the 13^th May, the club hosted a session to introduce the art of archery to a brand new group of people.  It was a bright day, with some excellent shooting for those who have never picked up a bow before.  For anyone interested in giving archery a try, the club will have a presence at the Writhlington Flower Show 19^th August and the Writhlington Fun Day 3^rd September.  Our next beginner’s course will commence on Saturday 9^th September.

Our newest juniors have been progressing well, following AGB progression awards for their age group and bow types.  Parker Edgell successfully completed the White – Outdoor award and Dylan Appleton the White and Black awards.

Finally, our ladder competition continues to produce some great matches and credit should go to David Aldridge who has made up 19 places on the ladder and is only 5 places from the top, held by Simon Whittle.

Congratulations to Parker Edgell who successfully attained the Archery GB White – Outdoor award and to Dylan Appleton who attained both the White and Black – Outdoor awards during May 2023.

South Wansdyke Archery Club has had a busy start to the outdoor season, but first there is a little time to reflect on the results of the Somerset County Winter Postal Leagues which ran from October to March.  Unfortunately, the club did not manage to defend its 2021/22 Senior Portsmouth league title, finishing the season in 4^th place (248 pts) behind Bowmen of Ina (265 pts), Bowmen of Danesfield (256 pts) and Wellington Bowmen (255 pts).  More success came in the Senior Frostbite league where, like last year, South Wansdyke were runner up to Burnham Company of Archer.  Burnham have won the trophy for the 7 years.

Spring has seen the completion of the first beginner’s course of the year, a perfect opportunity to learn a new skill and meet up with a group of friendly Archers.  Our beginner’s got to test their shooting ability in all weather.  They had extreme cold, rain, wind and beautiful sunshine.  After the course the club hosted a welcome event for our new archers to join a regular club session.  It was well attended with 24 archers on the shooting line.  The club is delighted that 8 of those who attended the course have joined the club and we are enjoying their company and helping them develop their skills further.  Our next beginner’s course will commence on Saturday 9^th September.

Further to the act of shooting, there is the question of maintaining and optimizing your archery equipment.  On the 1^st April, the club hosted a bow tuning session which was well attended.  Under the tutelage of Clive Jarrett club members had the opportunity to check equipment alignment, perform bare shaft checks and walk back test.  This set their bow up ready for the new season.

Outdoor, distance archery competition has also commenced.  Clive Jarrett and Clair Crook attended the Bath Archers Albion Shoot on the 9^th April.  Clair was runner up in the Ladies Compound Bow with a score of 777.  Whilst Clive, by his own admittance and high standards, did not have the best of days coming 7^th with a score of 729.

South Wansdyke has introduced a new club competition for the summer season, an archery ladder.  This is open to all bow types and abilities.  The archers position on the ladder was determined by a random draw.  Then they can challenge an archer up to three places above them on the ladder.  The challenge match is head to head matchplay.  This is the same as you would see in the knock-out stages of the Olympic archery tournament but shot at the distance suitable to the weaker archer.  We have seen a great turn out with 40 matches to date.  This included two single arrow shoot offs, won by Dean Broadway and Clair Crook.  Currently at the top of the ladder is Simon Whittle, but there is a lot of archery before completion of the competition in September.

With the changing of the clocks, the outdoor archery season is upon us.  However, before we focus on outdoor shooting it allows some reflection on the winter season.

On Sunday 29^th January the club hosted their annual awards.  Three archers received improved classifications through the year, Andrea Whittle 2^nd Class Archer, Clair Crook and Simon Whittle 1^st Class Archer.  Junior and Senior awards for greatest improvement went to Sophie Young and Simon Whittle respectively.  The pair also won the junior and Senior Chairman’s Cup for best average top three Frostbite scores.  The ladies Clout champion went to Janet Ross and Men’s Clout Champion to Andy Young.  Award for most scores submitted went to Andrea Whittle (Ladies), Clive Jarret (Mens) and Sophie Young (Junior).  Finally, the Graham Billam Member’s Choice Cup, voted for by members, went to Andrea Whittle for always being helpful, smiley, and approachable.

With new members joining the club following the autumn beginner’s course it was great to see some new faces.  This enabled to the club to introduce, for the first time, Archery GBs progression awards.  These awards are aimed at novice archers, especially juniors.  In February 2023 indoor white progression awards were attained, and certificates presented to Sharon Adams (Senior), Cody Adams (U14) and Elliot Crisp (U14).  

On Sunday 5^th February, South Wansdyke Archery Club had two representatives at the Grand Western Archery Society’s 48^th Indoor Championships.  Both Simon Whittle and Clive Jarrett were competing in the Gentlemen’s Recurve category, scoring 526 and 519 out of a possible 600.  This placed them 11^th and 13^th respectively, with Simon Whittle being particularly pleased shooting a personal best score.  The GWAS Champion in this category was Gavin Hayden of Supermarine Bowmen with a score of 543.

The winter County Postal league came to an end in March, South Wansdyke currently sits 4^th in the indoor Portsmouth league and 2^nd place in the outdoor Frostbite league.  Results will be posted next month.

Sunday 29th January saw the 2022 Annual Award presentations for South Wansdyke Archery Club held at our indoor shooting location Pratten’s Social Club. Thank you to all those who came to celebrate with our winners, it was great to have you there and hopefully most people won something in the raffle!

Three archers received improved classifications:

Here are our award winners:

Congratulation to Kim Gay (1st), Phil Beale (2nd), Janet Ross (3rd) and Clive Jarrett (Highest Score). All medal winners at our November indoor handicap. Competition was tight, with 23 points between 1st and 7th place.

Today’s fun shoot, organised by Sophie Young (thanks Sophie) was well attended by some new and some long standing members alike. Here are a few photos of the shoot, with everyone getting in the spirit!

On Saturday 15th October, SWAC invited Bitton Archers to compete in a Head to Head clout competition at Farrington Golf Club. Despite rain during setup we were treated to sunshine throughout the morning, but with a stiff head wind to keep us honest. A couple of sighter ends saw everyone try to get the distance, 140yds for the ladies and 160yds (the rough was a bit too close this year) for the men. Competition commenced for the 6 end round. All bow types were in evidence, compound, recurve, barebow and longbow.

Afterwards everyone met for a beer and a bite to eat in the club house, where the presentations were made for each bow type and the overall winner. The medals were presented by our previous SWAC Chairman Jim Linfield. Overall the honours went to Bitton Archers with an average score per archer of 24.25, beating SWACs average of 23.40. Congratulations to our friends at Bitton, we hope to see you again next year.

With the beautiful August weather South Wansdyke Archery Club saw a busy month for our 252 progression awards.  Newer members Phil Beale and Andy Hamblin attaining 20 and 30 yards awards shooting barebow.  Dean Broadway continued his great progress attaining his 40 yard award, also shooting barebow.  Phil’s success continued into September where is achieve the necessary score at 40 yards as well.

The club had representation at the 133^rd Writhlington Flower Show, to provide visitors with the chance to Have-A-Go.  The team of coaches saw a steady stream of people willing to give archery a go, with most shots hitting the target, followed by a general sense of achievement.

Competitively, several members competed in the Bath Hereford 2022.  A Hereford shoot is 6 dozen arrows at 80yards, 4 dozen at 60 yards and 2 dozen at 50 yards.  Clive Jarrett was runner up in the Gentlemen Recurve category, winning The president’s Cup and the silver medal, missing out on 1^st place by 17 points.  Andy Young placed 4^th.  In the junior ladies recurve, Sophie Young won the Red Shield and the Gold Medal with a score of 1058, this was tied highest score of the day in all recurve categories, including senior men.

As we moved into the latter end of the summer, the club had four representatives at the Great Western Archer Society Intercounties event.  Clair Crook (Ladies Compound), Sophie Young (Ladies Recurve), Janet Ross (Ladies Recurve) and Clive Jarrett (Mens Recurve).  The shoot was held at Exmouth Archers, between Somerset, Dorset & Wiltshire, Devon & Cornwall and Gloucestershire.   Our four archers helped Somerset place 2^nd with 24323 points.  The winners were Devon & Cornwall with 25944.

This autumn see a return to indoor archery and the clubs attempts to retain it senior and junior indoor county league trophies, the club hosting a head to head Clout shoot with Bitton Archers, a fun shoot at Halloween and the introduction of 8 new archers through our regular beginners course.

Well done to four of our club members (Sophie, Janet, Clive and Clair) who represented Somerset at this weekend Grand Western Archery Society Intercounties Tournament hosted by Exmouth Archers. Somerset were ultimately runners up to Devon & Cornwall.