As my love for archery grows so does my son Carson’s, luckily the school he attends has a wonderful program to keep that interest growing, NASP which stands for (National Archery In The Schools Program). This program is available to 4th grade and up, 4th and 5th graders are Elementary division, 6th- 8th are Middle Division and 9th-12th are High School Division. In the NASP league you are required to use a Mathews Genisis bow with no sights, no mechanical rest or releases, etc… they score it 5 arrows 3 times at 10 meters and 5 arrows 3 times at 15 meters, and if you have never shot a NASP regulation bow, its not as easy as it sounds, believe me! We bought him a Genesis early summer 2015 so that he would get a little time behind a style of bow that he wasn’t familiar with, and much to my surprise he would take to it well.
As the summer months passed he shot night after night, day after day and all that practice would soon shine through. As the school months begin we were soon involved in everything NASP, and I have since registered for a BAI instructor class to get my coaching certificate. They have practice on Tuesday and Friday nights and they are to participate in at least one practice each week to be eligible to shoot at tournaments, along with that they are to attend at least five local tournaments and one home tournament to be eligible for the State Finals in Des Moines in March. Our first tournament was Center Point, it was held at Hawkeye Downs Exhibit Center in Cedar Rapids, IA.
We really didn’t know what to expect since it was his first year and he had only been shooting this style bow for about 6 months, he did amazing coming home with 250 out of a 300, which earned him a 1st place finish out of 43, 4th grade boys and 7th out of 111 Elementary Division Boys. As the weeks went on we were competing every Saturday at different schools all the way from Bellevue, Ia to Solon Ia and in between, and he continued to improve landing a 1st place finish every week among the 4th grade boys and landing a couple 2nd place and 3rd place finishes among the Elementary Division Boys. We were told early on that the Elementary team for his school wouldn’t score well enough throughout the year to qualify to go to state, but we were told that they bumped Carson up to Middle Division ranking so that he would be eligible to possibly go to state finals but we wouldn’t know for sure until a couple of days after our last home tournament. He finished out the normal season strong with a 268 out of a 300. A few days after our last tournament I had gotten an email saying he was among 23 other kids that were selected to represent the Middle School Division at the State Finals.
State finals was quite the experience and was a great time. It just amazes me the number of kids that have taken to the sport of archery, it truly is a sport that anyone will enjoy. There were probably close to 1000 or better kids from all over Iowa at the state finals competing to go onto nationals and it definitely took an effect on the way Carson shot that day. He ended his season strong with a 237 out of 300 earning him a 21st place out of 89 4th grade boys, he also shot a NASP 3D tournament and placed 3rd out of 32 4th grade boys. Sadly it didn’t earn him a spot on the Nationals team that will be heading to Louisville, Kentucky May 12th but what we can take out of this year is the experience and the drive to achieve more in the years to come.
