End

Details

An end has a rhythm that repeats through the whole round: shoot your arrows within the time limit, walk to the target, score, pull and walk back. Under World Archery rules scoring takes place after each end, each archer calls the value of their arrows in descending order, and nobody touches the arrows or the face until every arrow on that target has been recorded. NFAA indoor rules likewise have archers record every arrow before any is drawn from the target.

How many arrows make an end depends on the round. World Archery ends are three or six arrows. On the 40 cm triple faces shot at 18 metres an individual end is three arrows, and if two land in the same spot only the lower one scores; team ends are six arrows, four for mixed teams. The NFAA indoor round is 12 ends of five arrows, grouped into three games of four ends, and a Vegas Shoot round is 10 ends of three.

The clock runs per end. World Archery sets the time per arrow, so an end of six gets twice the time of an end of three: for an individual end in qualification, 30 seconds an arrow at World Ranking Events and 40 at most other events. An NFAA indoor end allows four minutes for five arrows, and a Vegas Shoot end two minutes for three.

In World Archery match play the end takes on a second role. Individual recurve and barebow matches are shot in sets: each set is an end of three arrows, the higher score in it takes two set points, a tie gives one each, and the first archer to six set points wins. Individual compound matches stay cumulative, with the total of five ends deciding the match. Team matches use longer ends, six arrows or four for mixed teams, and are decided at five set points or over four ends.

For practice, the end is the natural unit to review. A single wide arrow stands out in an end total, and an end-by-end record shows whether your scores sag late in a round, when fatigue sets in or focus slips. Setting yourself a floor, such as no end below a chosen score, keeps attention on each group rather than on the running total.