Just call me the "Girl on Fire"

     This year Eek is starting an archery team and I took the job of coaching the team. Last weekend Dirk, Brett, and I all went through Basic Archery Instructor training. A guy that coaches archery in Bethel came out to Eek and gave us the training. It was awesome! I have been waiting for this since the beginning of the year. The training was for NASP, which stands for National Archery in the Schools Program. It is a really great program that is used in schools all over the world. There are competitions on the local, state, national, and international level. It is a very structured program and I really learned a lot from the training. I am much more comfortable shooting a bow now.

This is a heavy duty curtain we hang up and it catches all the arrows if they miss the target. This enables us to shoot inside.

The teachers become the students. Better study hard Dirk!

                         Not to shabby....                  Learning how to carry our arrows properly.

The range all set up, it is pretty cool.

Yeah, that's mine....

Practicing the "11 Steps to Archery Success."

     With NASP there are several steps the students have to go through before they can handle the actual bows. First, they have to practice with "String Bows," these are used so that students can safely learn the "11 Steps to Archery Success." 

The 11 steps are: 

1. Stance 

2. Nock Arrow 

3. Drawing Hand Set 

4. Bow Hand Set

5. Pre-Draw

6. Draw

7. Anchor

8. Aim

9. Shot set-Up

10. Release

11. Follow Through/ Reflect

     This is a really great program and I think the students will really enjoy it. The team is open to students in grades 6-12. We have a lot of interest for the team, about 30 students, so it will be interesting to see how the season pans out.