Finding Your Natural Stance

Here’s a rock-solid archery drill you can implement into any practice session to lock in that dead-center full-draw habit—even when your quiver’s empty and your muscles are screaming:

Your Stance Setup 

• Lay down a piece of cardboard taped at your shooting distance with a crisp shooting line. 
• Have at least three colored chalks or markers (e.g. red, green, blue) on hand—one per adjustment phase.

Baseline Markings 

• Stand in your neutral setup (feet shoulder-width, toes parallel to the line). 
• Use Color #1 to mark the position of your front and back foot edges on the cardboard.

Closed-Eye Draw Test 

• Close your eyes, draw to full anchor, then open your eyes—arrow nocked, but no shot fired. 
• Note: this isolates shoulder/hip alignment without the distraction of aiming or releasing.

Observe & Adjust 

• If the sight window sits left of the line, slightly open your stance (move back foot back or rotate hips outward). 
• If it’s right, do the opposite (rotate hips inward or adjust front foot). 
• Once you find the “sweet spot,” mark with Color #2.

Repeat Until Dead-Center 

• Measure and record your final foot placements (distance from center, angles off the tape line). 
• Do 1 set of 10 “eyes-closed draws → open-checks,” resting 30 sec between checks.

Transfer to Real Shooting 

• Nock an arrow, adopt your documented stance, and shoot 6 × groups of 6. 
• Check grouping consistency and make only the finest tweaks (you’re not reinventing your footwork now—just letting muscle memory take over).

Ongoing Habit Maintenance 

• Once a week, run through the closed-eye check as a quick 5-min warm-up.

Beyond this drill, you might love: 

Mirror-work for upper-body symmetry—draw in front of a full-length mirror, checking shoulder/hand/face position. 

Core-stability cross-training (planks, Pilates) to fight off fatigue-induced sway.

Next up: Want to dive into creating a simple log sheet to track these marks, reps and grouping data over time?