The Archery Club practices Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 6:30-7:30 at No Limits AV .
For more information visit BSU Archery Club on Facebook.
Archery isn’t just for Katniss Everdeen and Robin Hood. One Ball State club has brought the sport to students.
Carlas Bogue is the president and founder of the archery club. Bogue has shot competitive archery since 2008, and has a passion for the sport. Add to this the knowledge of other schools offering similar clubs, he started the club in spring 2015.
“I took two years off before starting college and knew collegiate-level sports were out of the question for me,” Bogue said. “I wanted something to be passionate about and to find other students with the same passion.”
Audrey Hall is the club secretary. She said she joined the club in order to add to her campus experience.
“I had not previously been involved with many groups or events on campus and was familiar with archery,” Hall said. “I had done archery before in middle school gym class.”
The club practices two times a week at No Limits AV. There are eight lanes, so the amount of time each person gets to shoot depends on how many people participate on a particular day. Less people means less time waiting in line and more time practicing.
During practice, the archers are simply trying to better themselves, said Bogue. They use what are called field arrow points, which have no blades. The only purpose is to penetrate the paper target at the end of the lane.
To shake things up at practice, archers will play tic-tac-toe, shoot balloons or use 3-D animal targets.
Hall enjoys the friendly atmosphere of the club. She has met many different people and enjoys seeing them improve.
“If there is one sport that doesn’t discriminate or judge, I feel that it is archery,” she said. “There is not anyone excluding someone for not doing well and no pressure to compete with others.”
The club does compete and is currently preparing for Indoor Nationals, Feb. 26-28 in Ohio. The event is hosted by USA Archery, the same organization affiliated with the Olympics. Competing on the collegiate level, the club will face schools, such as Purdue and Ohio State.
Other competitions in the spring include Outdoor Regionals, which take place Apr. 15-17 in Dublin, Ohio, and Outdoor Nationals, which occur May 19-22 in Lansing, Mich. Both competitions host long-distance shooting events.
Originally, the club had 40 to 50 archers a week, said Bogue. However, numbers have dropped due to the club not being able to shoot on campus. The archers have to drive almost 40 minutes to Winchester, Ind., in order to practice.
Practices have since been moved to No Limits AV in Muncie and Bogue hopes the change will draw in more students.
“[The archery club] was just allocated money to play archery tag on campus,” he said. “It’s like paintball, all the arrows have foam tips on them so it’s not dangerous at all. Hopefully this gets more people aware of the club.”
Hall said she felt included when she joined the archery club. She said club members pride themselves on keeping everything friendly.
“Archery in itself is fun because essentially you only have to compete against yourself, even if you aren’t interested in competition,” Hall said. “[But] when someone is shooting really well, the morale of the group as a whole makes it that much more enjoyable.”
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