Shooting offhand

[Fogalo]

I’m a righty. My doctor says I might be suffering some muscle imbalance in my back. I’ve been shooting 80lb bow for 12 years as a righty. I was considering getting a lefty recurve and relearning lefty.

Has anyone done this? I have to imagine there’s some shooting benefits as well. I played baseball in college and our hitting coach would have us hit our opposite hand. Not sure how much it helped but for shooting it might make you think a little more.

 

[Maverick1]

You should shoot with your dominant eye.

With the muscle imbalance, you would be better off to perform some strength building exercises to balance things out.

With the speeds achieved by today’s bows, you could drop down to 70 pound draw weight to lessen the imbalance and likely achieve the same arrow speed as your 12 year old bow.

Good luck!

 

[Fogalo]

Have you ever done it?

You should shoot with your dominant eye… but for this it doesn’t really matter. Goal here is to build strength and expand skillset. I do plenty of other exercises to help with the imbalance but there’s also a coordination imbalance that would be good to address.

 

[Healthy Scratch]

80 pound bow? Your definitely going to be ready for that water buffalo hunt. (Just kidding.) If you don't want to turn down your poundage, I think you should see a physical therapist. They should be able to hook you up with an exercise/work-out plan to meet your needs.

 

[HunterGatherer]

I’m a righty. My doctor says I might be suffering some muscle imbalance in my back. I’ve been shooting 80lb bow for 12 years as a righty. I was considering getting a lefty recurve and relearning lefty.

Has anyone done this? I have to imagine there’s some shooting benefits as well. I played baseball in college and our hitting coach would have us hit our opposite hand. Not sure how much it helped but for shooting it might make you think a little more.

Is the imbalance causing pain or other issues? If not, just embrace it. I don’t think you would see much benefit to training the bow arm to pull instead of push...

There’s lots of sports that cause imbalances- arm wrestling comes to mind. Those guys don’t try to achieve balance. Was listening to Devon Larratt talk about it the other day and he said he puts 80-90% of his total training volume into one arm, fwiw

 

[OverInfinite]

There is a guy on youtube called "Bow Only Outdoors", he has an uncommon disorder called task-specific dystonia that causes muscle shakes, its not target panic. He has a couple videos on making the switch to left hand solve the issue.
I added a recurve to my practice once a week and it is fun to add something with zero expectations but I would agree- just working out specific muscle groups would probably be a faster journey.

 

[Beendare]

I know 4 guys that have switched from R to L due to target panic and it worked out for them. It took them about a month to start shooting well.

 

[F16pointy]

I just workout regularly to keep symmetry, and I shoot at 70 lbs and kill stuff just fine. Although it is an interesting thought of shooting off hand, but I'm to anal to change what I have been doing and has been working for 40 plus years!

 

[Fogalo]

To be clear - I’m not having pain issues with the imbalance. Thought balancing it out might be productive.

I’ve been shooting right handed my whole life - even had a bought of target panic once. I have heard of guys shooting with their non dominant side and learning some interesting things and that rewiring to shoot with the other hand has made them better shots.

I’ve been shooting a rifle with both for awhile and it’s been interesting but I’m only really proficient enough in that for close range in case I need it while hunting.

 

[LostArra]

For me a muscle imbalance without pain or loss of function would be ignored unless you're bored or curious about shooting left handed. It's going to take a while for the left side to "catch up" and balance things out.

 

[Trumpkin The Dwarf]

I shot 70lbs with a longbow for several (very dumb) years after college. Literally warrantied a rinehart 18:1 with the volume I used to shoot. I can feel the muscle imbalance if I lie down on the hard floor. Right side of my back is much bigger than the left. It caused lots of neck and upper back issues. The reality is you probably won't ever commit to the volume that would solve your issue by shooting left handed for fun. Consistent upper back strength training in the gym has done way more for the imbalance than trying to remember to do draw and holds or shoot left handed ever did for me. Barbell rows are one of my favorite corrective exercises now. And if I've shot a lot I'll add a few sets of left side dumbbell rows on back day.