In most sports, it’s pretty easy to know who the winner is. It’s usually either whoever finished first, whoever scores the most points, or whoever does a certain thing in the least amount of time. But in archery, it’s all about taking aim and shooting a certain amount of arrows at a target. So how do you keep score?
It’s actually quite simple, although it might require some maths. The targets used in archery are usually round, and they have different circular sections within them, from the outer edge all the way to the point right bang in the middle.
These different sections have different point values, with the small circle in the middle being the highest value as it is the best and hardest shot to make. So once you’ve shot all of your arrows, you add up the points according to where the arrows hit the target, and that’s your final score! By the way, can archery improve eye sight? Find out here.
The highest score for a single arrow is 10 points, which you get if your arrow hits the inner middle circle of the bullseye, while the lowest score is a single point, which belongs to the outer circle on the edge of the target. If your arrow doesn’t hit the target at all, then you get no points at all, as it missed.
The number of arrows that you are allowed to shoot will depend on the type of archery competition you are in. But in Olympic competitions, for example, each archer will shoot 72 arrows, throughout 12 different phases of the competition.
So the overall points scored from those 72 arrows, is what gives them the score for their ranking. After that, they pass on to a knockout competition, one on one, and to win that they just have to score more points than the other archer.
So to win in an archery competition, you either have to accumulate the highest score in points possible, with the number of arrows you are allowed to use, or you have to beat all of the opponents thrown your way. It depends on the type of archery competition!
The best thing about keeping score in archery is that there is never any doubt about what points an archer scored. After all, the arrow is embedded in the target, and the points sheet over the target will have a very visible hole where the arrow hit, so it’s pretty clear!
What is a good score in archery?
Okay, so we now know how to keep score in archery, and how to determine and add up the points that you manage to accumulate with the number of arrows you are allowed to shoot. But…what is a good score in archery?
Well, let’s start by saying that a good score can be determined by your own personal average and improvement over time. So if you start off by scoring a certain amount of points, and then you slowly increase the score, each new record will be a great score by your standards!
But yeah, we get it, you want to know what a good score in archery is on average, for the general archer, not compared to just yourself.
If you’re a beginner, an overall score of between 200 and 250 would be considered a good start, and a standard good average score.
Of course, all archers end up striving for the perfect score of 300 out of 30 arrows, but it’s pretty hard to make a perfect shot 30 times in a row, so this is definitely something more suited to advanced and professional archers. But if you are doing around 250, or even above, then you’re well on your way to being consistently good, and might soon reach that 300!
As for the best possible score in archery…it is essentially scoring perfectly with every single arrow, so you get the top amount of points you are able to get. So if you always hit the bullseye with your arrow, getting the top points, then you’ll have a perfect overall score and can’t really get any better than that!
But if we were to search up the record for the best score in archery, what would it be? If you want to improve on an already perfect score, you can just up the number of arrows used, because eventually, you will miss the bullseye, right? So it would be about who got the best score throughout the most amount of arrows.
Currently, that record belongs to Mike Schloesser, from the Netherlands, as he scored an impressive 1421 points out of a maximum of 1440 points!
How many points can you get in archery?
The points that you can get in archery depend on the number of arrows you are allowed to shoot, with the maximum being the score you would get if all of them hit the bullseye.
In a single shot, the maximum amount of points you can get is 10, as that is the value of the bullseye in the middle of the target. The lowest amount of points you can get in a single shot is 1, by hitting the outer edge of the target. However, you could also get no points at all, which is what happens if your arrow misses the target completely!
But let’s look at all the possible points you can get in archery from a single arrow, by looking at the exact different number of points the target can provide you with, depending on where you hit it.
The target is circular, with different circular rings, going from the outer edge all the way to the bullseye circle in the middle.
Usually, there are 5 rings:
- The white ring: this is the outer ring, worth 1 point
- The black ring: this is worth 2 points
- The blue ring: this is worth 3 points
- The red ring: this is worth 5 points
- The yellow ring: this is the bullseye, worth 10 points
And if your arrow misses the target completely: you get 0 points
