Matteo Campagna
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Movement variability and individual technique: how the question has changed since 1971

Since 1971 more than fifty studies have measured how closely archers repeat their own shot and how much that shot resembles everyone else's. This page follows them in chronological order: variability falls as level rises, a single elite technique has never appeared, and the question has shifted to which variability matters for the arrow.

Studies in the registry
54
On archers
47
Years
1971-2026

Two intertwined questions

Studies that compare archers of different levels almost always ask two questions. The first is whether better archers repeat the shot with less variability than beginners. The second is whether the best archers share one way of shooting, a correct technique from which everyone else departs. In the registry these are two entries, variability in experts and a single elite technique, the most heavily documented in the technique domain.

This page follows them together, in chronological order, because only side by side do they show how the question has changed. Advice for archers is in the articles on repeatability, muscle synergies and motor learning.

1971-1998: each archer repeats themselves

The first trace comes from kyudo. In 1971 a Japanese group used a strain gauge to measure the force on the bow in three archers: the curve rose smoothly in the fourth-dan archer and in jerks in the beginner, with no figures given. In the 1980s Japanese electromyography described the champions' pattern alongside the beginners', and the two champions measured by Nishizono looked alike: a very active deltoid, a weak biceps, the two sides in balance. Two people, though, cannot show whether a model exists.

The figures arrived in 1990, from two independent groups. In the fifteen US national team archers studied by Martin and colleagues the muscle pattern of the release varied by 16% within each archer and by 52% between archers, and even the release split between relaxing the fingers and opening them actively. In Belgium Clarys and colleagues counted shot-to-shot identical patterns: 92% in the three Olympians, 41% in the six national-level archers, none in the six beginners. In 1994 twelve Italian archers showed near-identical traces across each archer's trials, no typical pattern across archers, and two different ways of reaching full draw, both found among the strongest. In 1998 nine German national team archers also differed in the geometry of shoulders and arms at full draw.

The data already had two sides: as level rises, each archer's own variability falls, not the distance from a shared model. That is why the entry on a single technique moved to refuted in 1994, with three independent samples and none in favour, and it has not moved since.

Consistency and score

The next step was to link consistency to points. In 2006 a Turkish study found a correlation of 0.72 between forearm repeatability around the clicker and FITA score, inflated, however, by the score assigned by default to the ten non-archers. Within one archer it gets more complicated: across sixty arrows from the world number two, shoulder consistency after the release tracked the score, with a coefficient of variation of 5.87% on the 10s against 14.01% on the 9s, while before the release the lowest value came on the 8s.

In 2018 thirty Japanese archers repeated their joint angles almost perfectly at every level (between-trial correlations above 0.97), but over five consecutive shots; in 2020 a gyroscope on the bow, over more than a hundred shots, split the shots of each of five archers into eleven to sixteen movement clusters per phase. How much variability turns up depends on what is measured and over how many shots.

From amount to direction

The turning point came in 2018. In six elite archers from a national team, ninety arrows each at 18 m, shoulders, elbows and wrists varied on the 9s and 10s in ways that cancelled each other out, with a compensation index at the release of around 0.4-0.6 against 0.1-0.3 on arrows scoring 6 to 8, and the compensation built up during the aim. The entry on joints that compensate for each other rests on this study, and a 2025 review reads it this way: on the elite's best arrows there is not less movement, there is movement that leaves the arrow's orientation unchanged.

Later studies show that amount alone does not tell the whole story. In the Polish national team the draw was less dispersed than in beginners, above all at the centre of mass (6.3 against 11.2), but in two of three complexity measures it was less regular, with more corrections. In twenty-eight Chinese archers, in a journal with questionable editorial standards, muscle consistency during loading separated experts from beginners (around 10% against 21%) but not elite from intermediate archers, and during the aim it separated no level at all. In 2026 a French thesis, eight elite against seven intermediate archers at 70 m, produced the most complete figures: the standard deviation of the score was 0.91 against 2.02, that of the shoulder angle 3.63 against 11.21.

The shared skeleton and the personal signature

There is no single technique, but something is shared. In the twenty-eight Chinese archers of the 2021 study the number of muscle synergies was the same at every level, about three, tied to the end of the draw, the aim and the follow-through; what changed was the consistency of the finish, with the follow-through synergy at 91% of the cycle and a standard deviation of 3.7 in the elite group, at 72% and 29.5 in the beginners. Angles divide too: in eighteen Bulgarian archers total flexion and abduction of the bow shoulder varied between archers by 6-8%, flexion of the same shoulder by 29-33%. The entry on fixed and personal angles remains descriptive.

The personal signature shows most clearly in competition. Among the top fifteen men and top fifteen women in the world rankings, filmed at events, each of the seven phases of the shot came in at least two forms: fourteen raised the bow straight along the line of the target, and sixteen lifted it higher before bringing it down. Other choices were widely shared, such as anchoring at the centre of the lips in twenty-one of thirty. At the 2007 World Championships the two recurve winners sat at opposite ends of aiming time, between 0.61 and 1.24 seconds per match for her, between 2.65 and 4.37 for him. In 2025 a neural network identified which of four Korean archers was shooting in 98.7% of cases, from shoulder, elbow and wrist trajectories alone. That is the entry on identifying the archer from movement, which rests on a choice between only four people.

Draw speed follows the same pattern: in 1997 experts drew faster than beginners, but among sixteen young Malaysian recurve archers who were already competent the difference disappeared (1.46 seconds in the better group, 1.36 in the others), and the entry on a faster draw is contested.

What holds and what remains open

The entry on variability has been reported since 1971 and has never moved: the direction has never been in doubt, but every study compares different groups measured once, and nobody has followed the same archers while they learnt. Taken together, what falls is the variability of whatever matters for where the arrow goes, and it falls between beginners and competent archers more than between those who shoot well and those who shoot better.

Two further questions remain open. Nobody has tried to separate the core shared by the best archers from the personal signature, and nobody has checked whether one of the styles seen in competition holds up better in wind or under pressure. Finally, each study uses a different variability index, and a tiny movement inevitably looks highly variable in percentage terms.

How we came to know it

  1. 1971OriginKamei et al. 1971 An Electromyographic Analysis of Japanese ArcheryThree kyudo archers and a strain gauge on the bow: the force curve rises smoothly in the fourth-dan archer and in jerks in the beginner. No figures, but the repeatability of the shot enters the literature.
  2. 1990ExtensionMartin et al. 1990 Electromyographic analysis of bow string release in highly skilled archersFifteen US national team archers: the muscle pattern of the release varies by 16% within each archer and by 52% between archers. Each one repeats themselves, and none resembles the others.
  3. 1990ReplicationClarys et al. 1990 Muscular Activity of Different Shooting Distances, Different Release Techniques, and Different Performance Levels, with and without Stabilizers, in Target ArcheryIn Belgium, fifteen archers at three levels: shot-to-shot identical muscle patterns account for 92% in the Olympians, 41% in the national-level archers and none in the beginners. It is the first comparison by level with a figure attached.
  4. 1994ExtensionSquadrone et al. 1994 Multifactorial analysis of shooting archeryTwelve Italian archers: near-identical traces across each archer's trials, no typical pattern across archers, and two different ways of reaching full draw, both found among the strongest.
  5. 1998ReplicationEdelmann-Nusser et al. 1998 Coordinative Aspects of Archery - An Approach Using Surface-ElectromyographyNine German national team archers: from one to the next the muscles differ, and so do the geometry of shoulders and arms at full draw and, with it, the joint moments.
  6. 2006ExtensionSoylu et al. 2006 Archery performance level and repeatability of event-related EMGTwenty-three people, elite archers, beginners and non-archers: forearm repeatability around the clicker correlates with FITA score (0.72), a figure inflated by the score assigned by default to the non-archers.
  7. 2007ContradictionYi et al. 2007 Evaluation on Motion Features of the World's Second Archer during Back-Tension in ArcherySixty arrows from a single world-class archer: after the release shoulder consistency tracks the score, before the release it does not. Within one person, more consistent does not mean closer to the centre.
  8. 2009ExtensionTakai et al. 2009 Characteristics of time spent on each phase during archery shooting: A study of the men's and women's individual gold medalists from the World Outdoor Archery ChampionshipsAt the 2007 World Championships the two recurve winners aim in opposite ways: the women's champion between 0.61 and 1.24 seconds per match, the men's champion between 2.65 and 4.37.
  9. 2014ReplicationSimsek et al. 2014 Kinetic and Kinematic Analysis of Recurve Archery Shooting TechniqueTwenty-seven Turkish archers at three levels: finger, wrist and elbow angles at the release do not differ between elite, intermediate and novice archers.
  10. 2018MethodShinohara et al. 2018 Analysis of Muscular Activity in Archery: A Comparison of Skill LevelThirty Japanese archers, five consecutive shots: joint angles repeat almost perfectly at every level, with between-trial correlations above 0.97. How much variability turns up depends on what is measured and over how many shots.
  11. 2018ExtensionSerrien et al. 2018 The Uncontrolled Manifold Concept Reveals That the Structure of Postural Control in Recurve Archery Shooting Is Related to AccuracySix elite archers from a national team, ninety arrows each: on the 9s and 10s the joints vary in ways that cancel out and leave the arrow's direction unchanged. The movement does not disappear; it is channelled.
  12. 2020ContradictionKawaguchi et al. 2020 Archery shots visualization by clustering and comparing from angular velocities of bowsA gyroscope on the bow and over a hundred shots per archer: each of the five archers' shots split into 11 to 16 movement clusters per phase. Seen up close, the repeated shot is a set of variants.
  13. 2021ExtensionZhang et al. 2021 Muscle coordination during archery shooting: A comparison of archers with different skill levelsTwenty-eight Chinese archers at three levels: about three muscle synergies at every level, covering the same phases. What changes is the consistency of the finish: the follow-through synergy has a standard deviation of 3.7 in the elite group and 29.5 in the beginners.
  14. 2022ReviewVendrame et al. 2022 Performance assessment in archery: a systematic reviewA systematic review of 41 studies: all archers follow the standard phases of the shot, each with their own strategy of muscles, timing and posture, and repeatability is named as the factor that most distinguishes the best.
  15. 2023ExtensionAzadjou et al. 2023 Dynamical Analyses Show That Professional Archers Exhibit Tighter, Finer and More Fluid Dynamical Control than NeophytesFourteen Polish national team archers against fourteen people who had never shot: the experts' draw is less dispersed, above all at the centre of mass (6.3 against 11.2), but less regular in two of three complexity measures.
  16. 2024ContradictionZhang et al. 2024 Questionable venue Comparative Analysis of Shooting Consistency Among Archers of Different Skill LevelsThe same twenty-eight archers as in 2021, in a journal with questionable standards: muscle consistency during loading separates experts from beginners (around 10% against 21%), but no difference emerges between elite and intermediate archers.
  17. 2024ExtensionShafizadeh et al. 2024 Technical performance differences in elite Olympic recurve archersThirty archers from the top fifteen places of the men's and women's world rankings, filmed at events: each of the seven phases of the shot comes in at least two forms, from the way the bow is raised to the way the follow-through ends.
  18. 2025ExtensionPark et al. 2025 Deep Learning Sequence Network for Identifying and Analyzing Archery Shooting PatternsFour Korean national-level archers, 5,984 shots: from shoulder, elbow and wrist trajectories alone a neural network identifies the archer in 98.7% of cases. The choice, however, is between four people.
  19. 2025ExtensionIvanov 2025 Study on the stability and positioning of the shoulders on the points and accuracy in archeryEighteen high-level Bulgarian archers: total flexion and abduction of the bow shoulder vary between archers by 6-8%, flexion of the same shoulder by 29-33%. Part of the geometry is shared, part is personal.
  20. 2025ReviewSantos et al. 2025 Relationship Between Shooting Performance and Biomechanical Parameters Associated with Body Stability in Archery: A Systematic ReviewA review of sixteen studies on body stability reinterprets the 2018 result: on the elite's most accurate arrows there is not less movement, but movement that leaves the arrow's orientation unchanged.
  21. 2026ReplicationJacquot 2026 Analyse multidimensionnelle de la performance en tir à l'arcEight elite French archers against seven intermediate archers at 70 m: lower arrow-to-arrow dispersion in the elite group (score 0.91 against 2.02, shoulder angle 3.63 against 11.21), and score predictors that differ from archer to archer.

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168 claims · 88% with evidence on archers

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Cite
APA

Campagna, M. (2026). Movement variability and individual technique since 1971. In Research. matteocampagna.com. Retrieved 16 October 2026, from https://matteocampagna.com/en/research/movement-variability-individual-technique

BibTeX
@misc{campagna2026_enresearchmovementvariabilityindividualt,
  author = {Campagna, Matteo},
  title = {Movement variability and individual technique since 1971},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {Research, matteocampagna.com},
  url = {https://matteocampagna.com/en/research/movement-variability-individual-technique},
  note = {accessed 2026-10-16}
}