The Movement Toward Olympic Compound Bow Competition

[pianoman9701]

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/compound-archery-shoots-for-olympic-inclusion/

I'd like to see it but the article makes a great point that recurves require not only the aim, but the physical aspects that shooting a compound bow doesn't have for the most part. And what is Olympic competition but the test of what these athlete are made. Is shooting a compound a physical test like shooting a recurve?

[Jellymon]

Is shooting an air rifle at 10yds with a shooting jacket a physical test like a recurve? There are a lot of Olympic sports that don't require a lot of physical effort. If compound is its own category seperate from recurve I see no reason why it shouldn't be included.

I think thier real fear is if compound is included then a lot of the recurve shooters will switch over and eventually recurve will lose a lot of its popularity. Kind of like most 3d shoots nowadays. Compound target archery is huge in Europe and Asia.

[pianoman9701]

As the article stated, one other problem is that as compared to recurves, many countries don't have a lot of compound bows and the kind of support they need. Third world countries especially don't have any exposure to them. So the pool of shooters would be limited to far fewer countries.