Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Bowhunting shoulder problems

I have a question about shoulder stability/accuracy. I am a new bowhunter and don't have a lot of experience with practice regimens, although I've been shooting a few times a week for the past few months. I shoot a Mathews compound and it's set at 65 lbs., for elk. I shoot right-handed and I have some stability problems in my left shoulder.

When I practice, I find that I'm fairly accurate for the first 10-12 arrows and then my shoulder begins to fatigue and accuracy falls off some.

Is this fairly normal for you guys, or can you usually shoot more before you get shoulder fatigue? Are there things I can do to lessen this?

I'm not an archery expert but I have dabbled in archery.

Why not just back off the draw weight for awhile? If it's just muscle fatigue the more your able to shoot the easier it gets.

As far as hunting goes even 60#'s is an adequate draw weight. Sure, more is better but being able to comfortably draw at any angle or in any situation is far more important than just speed. I don't know if that's an issue for you or not. Just sayin'

FWIW I've never experienced shoulder fatigue like you have and I even had surgery on my left shoulder. It was 30 years ago that I had the surgery though.


fish head

Yea you maybe over doing it. Other than its fun to shoot if you can shoot 10 good shots a couple of times a week or every day and from varing distances you shoold be ok. I have had some bad days but in my wildest dreams I have never got 10 shots in a day at elk. Don't over do it that may be worse than not shooting at all. In your off days when your not shooting you may if you can just draw and hold to strengthen the shoulder a little bit.

Plus its the first one that counts. grin

The solution is fairly simple- just back off the draw weight a bit.
I shoot two Mathews bows, a Drenalin and a Reezen. Just before hunting season, when I have been shooting a lot, I have both bows set around 64#, and can shoot 30-40 arrows in practice with no fatigue.

However- after hunting season, when I have not been shooting a lot for several months, I find I need to back them off a couple of pounds to be able to shoot comfortably.

I let the bows tell me what is the right poundage- if I get fatigued after a dozen arrows, it's time to back off the poundage a bit.

I also find it interesting that backing off a few pounds makes only a very little difference in trajectory.

when you start to fatigue thats when you start to get into bad hbits.you also start fooling with the equipment and that just leads to more mistakes.shoot your good 10-15 arrows then stop.your shoulder will get stronger,and you will be able to shoot more. good luck

Thanks all.

IMO, you have to get in shape to shoot a bow just like anything else.

incline pushups are very simple, and amazingly effective. every other morning when i walk in my bathroom to get ready for work, i stand about 5' from my bathroom vanity, and do 25-30 pushups with my hands on the edge of the vanity. i brush my teeth and do 25-30 more, and go on my way.

after 2 weeks of this you WILL see and feel results. after a year of it, you will see a HUGE difference. and it takes a grand total of about 2 minutes.

also, i don't believe in shooting tons of arrows. to my mind, the only thing it accomplishes is familiarity with your bow, release etc. i pretty much shoot 3 or 4 sets of 3 arrows, 4 or 5 times/week. i don't shoot year round, but i start around the first of June.

+1

My problem is not physical conditioning, it's an unstable shoulder, as I said. I was told I needed surgery 5-6 years ago, but elected not to get it. Surgery sucks.

I go to the gym 6 days a week when I'm not traveling. Used to bench more than my weight and do dips with a 45-lb. plate on a belt, but had to give both those up due to the shoulder issues. For upper body, now I do push-ups, military style, three sets of 30 or more, pull-ups and lat pull-downs, seated cable rows (mimics drawing a bow), a couple different cable flies that isolate the shoulder,(shown to me by a physical therapist), dumbell flies (mimics holding a bow, try holding dumbells out to the side with your arm fully-extended) curls, arm extensions on a Swedish ball, etc.

The shoulder is just unstable.

Back off the poundage.. Mine is set at 62# because of a torn labrum and a tear in my bicep... I go outside once a day, sneak around, slowly creeping up on my target.. And when it's not looking I'll get a shot off!!! One shot a day, rain,snow,or shine,wind. I either kill it or I don't!! lol

I'll shoot it at different angles,and through the brush. And at least once a week from my knees...

Whatever the weight my be you should beable to come to full draw by only pulling the string straight back. No other movement at all.. Shot a nice doe last year!

Generally the first shot is all you'll ever need..

Good luck

That's how I do it, straight back.

Your shoulder ain't gonna fix itself Smoke, and you ain't gettin' no younger. The older you get the slower you'll heal. Get your shoulder fixed. I had mine done, best move I've made yet.

Having said all that, since, like you, I ain't a spring chicken anymore, I opted for a set of 50-60# limbs for my Matthews. Those limbs, cranked all the way up, will probably be faster than 60-70# limbs set on 65# ('cause the limbs flex more when the limb bolts are all the way in). So, the only thing you'll be giving up is some money.

you said in your original post it was "fatigue", or i wouldn't have written what i did. my apologies.

in that case, i'd get a crossbow to use while recovering from my shoulder surgery.

Basically it is fatigue of the rotator cuff muscles that originate on the scapula. When your rotator cuff gets stretched out, those muscles have to contract harder to keep the humeral head (ball on the end of the upper arm bone) located in the glenoid fossa (shoulder socket).

Smoke, the fact that you can even pull a bow means your shoulder should be easy to repair, unless you keep putting it off and really let it get screwed up.

I'll probably have to do that, but not until after this season at the earliest. I drew an archery bull tag in a unit that takes 10+ years to draw here.



I'd probably just go back to using a muzzleloader. Can I say that on a bowhunting forum?

Plus, crossbows aren't legal during archery seasons here.

Acupuncture and Cortisone are the only things that worked for me. Won't work always and Cortisone is best avoided.

Physical therapy exercises can help but probably just postponing getting it fixed.

All these are stopgap/tire patches for a stretched or torn rotator cuff. Unless you are making seven figures throwing a ball, I'd avoid cortisone injections.

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I'd do the same thing. I'd start working on my setup like, tommorrow, get some lighter limbs etc, see an archery guru if one is available. A little lighter weight might get your through. Obviously you'll need to keep practice sessions short, maybe shoot twice every other day or whatever so you don't overwork those muscles that attatch to the cuff.

With the newer bows 60 lbs is the new 70 in terms of arrow speed. I'd back off on the weight. Even 50 will get the job done handily as long as you know the range.

It sounds like a possible form, shoulder alingment problem to me. You should have your bow shoulder low and in line forming a "T" shape. If you are over extending or pushing your bow shoulder forward you will have issues like stated above. Look closely at the photos of the pro archers in the bow catalogs and try to imitate thier form. Good Luck