We had mechanical releases long ago. Very good ones, at that. Hardly 15% of archers used them. It wasn't until the mid-90's that I attended a tournament where there were more release shooters than there were fingers shooters. By that time, bows had shrunk from around 45" down to 40", letoffs had gone from 50% up to 65% and they were getting harder to shoot with fingers. Now a 40" bow is considered a l-o-n-g sonuvagun and letoffs are ridiculously high, up to 99%! It's not that the release makes it easier to shoot accurately. It's that the vast majority of today's bows are designed for the release and are nearly impossible to shoot with fingers.
I never thought about it that way because I started using a release long ago (over 20 years ago) , but it does make perfectly good sense. If a beginner compound shooter wanted to start off with a compound that he could finger shoot with these days he/she would have a hard time finding something that wouldn't (A) force them to use a release or (B) send them back to traditional.[&:] It's too bad! My favorite bow of all time was my Martin Firecat w/50% letoff , 43" ata , 8 3/4" brace height. God I miss her!
