straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

when i was purchasing my bow ,upon paper tuning the pro shop owner noticed i shoot with my elbow in the locked position. he recomended that i shoot with a slightbend in my elbow. i just did not like the way the bow felt though..i notice on alot of these shows on the outdoor channel , the locked elbow seems to be pretty popular.is it just a matter of preference or has my form just been incorrect from the onset?

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

Funny how things change... Back in the day, we were all taught to use a high wrist, straight elbow technique with our recurves and compounds. That changed when they started dropping brace heights to jack up arrow speeds. People actually HAD to start shooting low wrist with a bent elbow to keep the string from beating their arm to pieces.

The same question comes up with new longbow shooters. You shoot longbows with a low wrist and slightly bent elbow, exactly the same style as today's compounds are intended to be shot. How much is the correct amount of bend? When you put the heel of your hand down on the grip, your elbow naturally takes the correct amount of bend.

Hold your bow arm out straight, but relaxed (do not lock out your elbow!) and keep your wrist straight like you would if assuming a high wrist grip. Now, bend your wrist back, as if you were switching to a low wrist grip. Your elbow will bend slightly. That is pretty much the correct amount of bend for the way your bone/muscle structure is built. Someone else might have more or less bend in the elbow, but that's because they're put together a bit differently.

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

I shoot with a straight elbow, might even be locked out. Don't care and ain't going to change cause that's the way the bow gets steady for me..[&:] and I want a steady bow..:). a lot more than I want to fit into someones diffenation of what is correct... [:@]

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

Hey Art... ever see someone shooting a Protec with the factory grip with a high wrist grip? :eek: Hurts for a while, but once I got used to the feel, the accuracy made it worth it!

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

My arm is allways bent slightly if i keep it straight it smacks the far out of it

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

I wouldn't say that I shoot with a noticably bent arm, but my elbow isn't locked.

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

Sounds like we got our bows at the same shop.:D

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

Josh, that skinny grip is the one thing I dislike about my ProTec.It does hurt if you high wrist it all the way through the draw. I got to where I'd draw my ProTec low wrist, then straighten it out into a high wrist when I got to full draw.

I notice Hoyt's got a an actual grip they're putting on newer ProTecs now, instead of those cheezy little wooden plates on each side of the grip.

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

Ditto Art. But once you get to that high wrist grip, it seems like any torque problems i have are gone!

Anywho, that sideplate on the right side of the grip is WAY too small for my thumb. I could carry a spare arrow between my thumb and the inside of that grip!

RE: straight elbow, slightly bent elbow
 

I think Arthur's comments pretty much summed up my opinion on the subject as well. "Back in the day" the preferred shooting style was a high wrist grip with a straight arm but that seems to have changed. I will leave it up to folks like Arthur to supply the reasons though I have no doubt that bow design changes were a big part of it.

I personally shoot with a slightly bent bow arm as I believe it promotes more control and a steadier aim. That is typically the form style I pass onto others.