OUR MISSION
The U.C. Merced Archery Team's mission and purpose is to invite our fellow bobcats into the international community of college archery. Accepting students of all skill levels to join and become archers, we help our members develop the skills to compete at the multiple archery tournaments we attend, all while building a strong sense of comradery and encouraging friendships along the way.
WHAT WE OFFER MEMBERS
Upon joining, our members will have access to the university's club bows, arrows, and safety equipment for the entire academic year, which they may use to practice and compete with. We currently cater to olympic recurve and barebow archery and are working to better supply archers who want to follow the compound/bowhunter disciplines. Members are also granted special 24/7 access to the campus range so that those with their own equipment may practice whenever they can.
U.C. Merced Archery prides ourselves with our group of trained and certified volunteer archery instructors and coaches to train new archers and to work with experienced archers to improve their skills. Coaching and instructor services, as well as equipment rentals for the academic year, are included into your club dues.
Participation in tournaments is highly encouraged, though not required, for all of our members, as they can meet and test their abilities against other university archers, as well as become closer to their team mates. We represent U.C. Merced at a handful of tournaments each year and for members who choose to become competitive, we try to financially assist them with hotel and registration costs as much as we can.
ARCHERY DISCIPLINES
Olympic Recurve
The team's premiere archery discipline, olympic recurve archery consists of using a recurve bow with a mounted stabilizer and a sight to assist with aiming and stability. However, a lot of practice and fine tuning are required for recurve archers to hit their targets with a high level of accuracy. This form of archery is the same type as seen during the summer olympics and is widely popular among college archery teams.
Barebow
Usually the first discipline our members learn, barebow archery is where the archer only uses a bow without any sights or stabilizers, and is the more common form of archery. This is the first form of archery we teach our members before encouraging them to branch out and explore the other disciplines. It is very common for our archers to fully dedicate themselves to barebow archery and train to be as accurate and skilled as recurve archers and embracing the more traditional sides of natural archery.
Compound/Bowhunter
Our compound and bowhunter archers use special bows and equipment that differ from those used in recurve and barebow archery, and use slightly differing skills and training in order to hit their targets with incredible accuracy. This form of archery is widely popular among hunters and we usually encourage our archers to try this form of archery after understanding the basics of recurve or barebow archery. We happily accept archers with prior experience with this form of archery to join and practice their discipline alongside with us. Currently, we are still in the process of obtaining club equipment for our archers interested in compound and bowhunter archery. Archers who wish to take up this discipline currently must provide their own gear.
