Third finger in pain.

[Malko]

I'm a recurve archer and my third finger (the ring bearer) is in pain every time I shoot an arrow...

any ideas?
Could the fact that I still shoot my old bow (with 66" limbs) with a 30" drawlength be the problem? I suppose the string is quite at an angle at the finger level.

Or is it a bad position of my fingers? I tried changing and forcing the pressure on the 2 other fingers but it didn't really help.

I'm shooting ~38lbs
thanks

[kae]

Sounds like your bow is very short for your draw length, you should be looking at medium or even long limbs.
Something else to try, when your holding the string, rotate your hand away from the bow, so as to deepen the hook with your third finger on the string.

[Malko]

I have order a new bow and the limbs will be in 68". hopefully will receive it next week.

'deepening the hook' will probably affect my release quite a bit.. are there some arrow behaviors to worry about? (arrows going on the left or stuff like that?)

[Shirt]

One thing I discovered was when my draw elbow crept up really high, it took the wrist with it, and thus pulled my ring finger off the string. Might be worth looking at? :)

[Flehrad]

If you deepend the hook with the finger positions so that the top and bottom fingers both sit in with the string in the joint (and don't worry about the middle finger), then you may find that upon a relaxed release it will loose fairly cleanly as both fingers leave the string simulteaneously.

If they are not both positioned in the joint, then you may get a plucking effect where the bottom finger will slide off first (thus causing a bit of grazing pain) before the other fingers go, thus throwing your arrows left/right.

But if you can pluck consistantly, you can always compensate :P

[James Park]

I am not certain of this but I understand that if the string is in a certain position on the ring finger it can pinch a nerve. Not the case with the other fingers.

[Flehrad]

Ah, I can tell you that the nerves on all of your fingers (thumb is not a finger) run on the lateral edges of the bone.

What also runs with the nerves is the blood supply, so depending on the string angle with your limbs, the top finger and bottom fingers could experience pinching of both blood supply and nerves on their edges.

If that is the case, either use a bigger tab that wraps around the bottom edge of your ring finger or use longer limbs to reduce the string angle....

[Aarleks]

Good info Don.

[Malko]

ok. thanks.
I'll start by getting my 68" limbs, and probably add a bit of leather on my finger tab.

cheers

[DanceswithDingoes]

At 30" you'ld best be served with a set of 70" limbs perhaps. I agree with the others, too acute a string angle at your draw, thus finger pinch.

[The One]

I would say that 68s would be fine at 30" - you should be able to get a bit more speed out of them.

I have problems with my ring finger too - there's some sort of tendonny, nervey thing that the string rolls over, and is a little disconcerting to shoot with. Hence, I have to use a shallow grip on that finger, while a deeper grip would be more preferable. Kind of annoying, really - Nothing I can do about it!

[Flehrad]

On all fingers, the tendons for them run down a groove in the middle of each finger.
There is usually 2 layers of tendons, one to pull in the whole finger, and the second to pull in the tips of your fingers.
Any movement inbetween is a combination of the two tendons.
The blood supply and nerves run on the edges of the finger because there is not space in the groove, and if there was, they would be getting a lot of griding against the bone from the tendons.

70" is better for your fingers, yes you might lose some speed, but you could always go up in poundage to compensate :wink:

[A&O]

pulling 30.25" and just went from 68" for 7 year to 70" and shooting much better..

[The One]

70" is better for your fingers, yes you might lose some speed, but you could always go up in poundage to compensate :wink:

true true - I've just always been moving up age groups etc for most of my archery career, and not being all that strong, I place a lot of emphasis on speed. I suppose if you can make 90m no problems, then 70" would be a better bet.