Archery

Archery - Timeline

August 2021 - started archery at Archers Artemis, Massachusetts

September 2022 - joined MIT Archery Club and MIT Archery Team, led by Coach LeBre

MIT Archery Team (September 2022 - May 2024)

The MIT Archery Team is a group of MIT students who represent MIT at USA Archery collegiate tournaments. As part of the MIT Archery team, I competed at:

Lancaster 2023

Indoor Nationals 2023 - Fiskdale, MA

Outdoor Collegiate Regionals 2023, Northeast Region - Harrisonburg, VA

Indoor Nationals 2024 - Fiskdale, MA

Outdoor Collegiate Regionals 2024, Northeast Region - Harrisonburg, VA

Outdoor Collegiate Nationals 2024 - Statesboro, GA

Jamaican Archery Team

In July 2024, I will represent Jamaica at the Caribbean Development Competition in Ocho Rios, Jamaica.

Outdoor Practice Field at MIT

You can take the student out of student government but you can’t take the student government out of the student.

When I joined the team and club, there was a need for an outdoor MIT range as, at the time, we were limited to an indoor range (18 m) at MIT. The ability to shoot outside would make the team more competitive as it enabled us to practice at the longer outdoor tournament distances, 50 - 70 m, and under variable weather conditions

However, permission to shoot outdoors required 1) figuring out where to shoot, 2) figuring out how to shoot safely, and 3) convincing the MIT administrators of both. In spring 2023, I constructed the slide deck for my pitch to the Director of Facilities and Operations, Manager of Club Sports, and the MIT Environment, Health, and Safety Office. The slide deck contained pictures of outdoor practice fields at other universities, outdoor range standards from the USA Archery and Archery Great Britain, and the benefits to the team and MIT if we were able to get permission to use Briggs Field for practice.

We secured permission, conditioned on the construction of a fence to surround the range. The goal of the fence was to delineate the space and protect onlookers from unwittingly walking into the range safety zone. It had to be 400 feet long, and able to be assembled and disassembled for each practice. The fence was completed in Spring 2024, with the inaugural practice taking place May 5, 2024!

Arrow Building and Other Gear Modifications

In Archery, there are many oppurtunities to customize your setup, at varying technical levels - from color selection of equipment to building one’s own string. I build my own arrows, and apply the serving to my strings.

I enjoy the process of building my arrows - it’s meditative and builds my familiarity with my arrows. I cut my arrows and attache the points and fletching myself. In my indoor setup, I currently use feathers on Easton XX75 aluminum arrows, with nibb points. My outdoor setup uses Spider Vanes Ultrasoft on Easton ACC arrows with the recommended steel points at 100 grains weight. All uses beiter nocks.

The second feature I customize myself is the serving - this is the wrapping around the bow string that forms the layer between the string and your arrows. Getting the fit right - dependent on strand count, serving string diameter, winding tightness and nock size - changes how much energy transfers to the arrow upon release as well as the consistency of this transfer from arrow to arrow.