Archery Basics Explained - Draw Length vs. Arrow Length.

Are you an archer looking to understand the difference between draw length and arrow length? In this video, I'm going to explain the differences between the two, show you how to measure them accurately, and why it's important for archery performance. Welcome to Archery Basics Explained, where I break down the fundamentals of archery into easy-to-follow bite-sized formats. For more of these, be sure to subscribe below and hit that notification bell. I got a lot of these coming out lately and I'm excited to bring them to you. First, let's talk about your draw length. There are two different ways to discuss draw length. One is your actual raw draw length, and then another is your AMO, or Archery Manufacturer's Organization, draw length standard measurement. Both of those are important. The raw draw length is more important to discuss with your friends, and potentially the AMO draw length is more important when you call up your local pro shop to order more arrows or to discuss ordering a different bow. First, let's cover raw draw length. That is the distance from the knock to the pivot point of the grip, which is right here, when at full draw. So if I were to pull back my bow and measure from the groove of the knock to the pivot point of the grip when at full draw, that is considered my raw draw length. Getting an accurate measurement of your raw draw length in this manner is only as accurate as your form is good, because if your alignment is off or how far you pull the bow back is changing, your draw length can change. So a way around the technique issue is to use the wingspan method, and that is basically to open your arms up in a wingspan and measure from the tip of your middle finger to the tip of the other middle finger, and then divide by two and a half, and you'll get your rough approximate raw draw length. Again, the raw draw length can be very dependent on your technique, so if your wingspan method measurement is way different than your actual raw draw length, you might want to consider talking to a coach or trying to work on your alignment to get a little bit better technique. Now let's talk about the AMO industry standard draw length. When you come to full draw, you measure from the groove of the nock and then you add one and three quarter inches past the pivot point of your grip, making it a longer measurement. The reason the AMO industry standard draw length is important is when you make a phone call to a local shop or you go into an archery range and you discuss your AMO draw length, they know exactly what you're talking about and they can get you a bow or an arrow that's set up pretty close to what you're going to need, and it's not going to be too far off. Where this gets confusing is when you're having a chin wag with a friend or somebody who's in the archery industry and you're talking about draw length, it just can be confusing because there's the raw draw length and the AMO draw length and they're considerably different, and so it's important to understand the difference between the two and then you can quantify a little bit better with your friends or the pro shop owner what the draw length is that you're discussing. Now let's talk about arrow length. Let's first talk about how to measure the arrow length and then why it's important. To measure arrow length, it's very simple. All you need is a tape measure and you measure from the of the nock where it pushes onto the string to the end of the shaft, not to the end of the arrow point. The reason you go to the end of the shaft is it's a industry standard thing. Just like AMO draw length, it's all the same language when you talk to different people in the archery industry, whether that be arrow manufacturers or pro shop owners. When you say my arrow length is 29 inches, that means it's from the groove of the nock to the end of the shaft exactly at 29 inches. Point lengths vary, and it is also an important thing to measure the groove of the nock to the end of the point in total arrow length. Points are not created the same. They are all different, all different lengths, different arrows have different length points, and different weight points have different lengths sometimes as well. The reason this is important is if you were to call a pro shop and say my arrow from the groove of the nock to the end of the point is whatever distance it is, and I would like another set of arrows built to be that exact same parameter, the shop can then order the arrows, order the components, measure the length of your point, deduct it from your total arrow length, and then cut the arrow shaft to the exact length. So that way you have the exact same total arrow length in your hands. So if you're shooting Olympic style recurve, you don't have to adjust your clicker, and it feels the same exactly. This isn't super, super important because unless you're using a clicker that is on the arrow and a limb driven clicker, you're not going to be affected by this. Now you may think that shouldn't my AMO draw length, or my raw draw length, or my arrow length, or my actual arrow length be somewhat similar? No. There's four different things that we just talked about and they're all very different, and for various different reasons your arrow length may not match your draw length or be even close to it. For example, check this out, when I come to full draw, my arrow is much longer than even my AMO draw length. You'll see that it's sticking out the front of the bow a considerable amount longer compared to from the pivot point plus an inch and three quarters, which would be my AMO draw length. My arrow's an extra several inches past that. Various different reasons why I chose to do this, I'm not going to bore you with those examples, but it's just important to note that there are differences between draw length, AMO draw length, arrow length, and raw total arrow length. If you liked Archery Basics Explained, please consider subscribing, hitting that notification bell down below. 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