*(New to barebow entirely? [Start here](/forum-thread.html?id=d4b44f5a-d1b9-433a-969e-5edc0eeb3914) — the gear rules, string walking, and how aiming works with no sight.)* If you're shooting barebow and string walking, you've already solved the distance problem — you slide down the string, the arrow tip comes up under your eye, and the trajectory takes care of itself. What nobody tells you is that you then have to make a second decision, and it matters more than it looks: **where on the target do you put that arrow tip?** There are three common answers. One of them is much better than the others, and it isn't the one most people start with. --- ## Option 1: the six o'clock hold (a.k.a. "lollipopping") You put the tip of the arrow at the **bottom edge** of the spot you're shooting at, so the spot sits on top of the point like a lollipop on a stick. **Why people like it** - It's a genuinely fine, precise thing to aim at — a hard edge rather than a vague middle. - You can see the whole gold. Covering the thing you're looking at with a chunk of arrow feels wrong to most people, in the same way it would feel wrong to hold your hand over someone's face while you talked to them. It works. Plenty of people shoot it indoors, at 50 meters, on field courses, animal and hunter rounds. But it carries three problems that only show up later. **Problem one: your impact point moves when the target face changes size.** This is the big one. Your aiming reference is the *edge* of the spot, so the size of that spot silently sets how far above the point your arrow lands. Shoot a small face and the group lands a little above your tip. Shoot a bigger face with a six o'clock hold and your impact point is now much higher — and **nothing about your distance changed**. Field archery is the obvious trap here, because you shoot the same face from several distances and the spot's apparent size changes with every one of them. If you only ever shoot one face at one distance, this problem disappears entirely. Most people don't. **Problem two: aiming off gets messy.** Holding straight left or straight right for wind is easy — the human eye is good at picking a point directly beside something. But once you're holding low *and* off to the side, you no longer have a vertical reference to work from, and your height starts wandering along with your windage. **Problem three: it fights the way you execute the shot.** If you're pushing tension and direction toward where you want the arrow to go, aiming six o'clock means you're pushing at one place while intending the arrow to land somewhere else. That's a genuinely awkward thing to hold in your head. Some people solve it by pushing toward the aiming point instead, but then the two halves of the shot are pulling against each other. --- ## Option 2: covering the whole gold Don't, if you have a choice. You've buried the target under your arrow, and now you're aiming at something you can't see. The exception is unavoidable: if your point-on distance is shorter than the round you're shooting, you'll have to hold high and cover things. That's the nature of the beast at long range, not a technique you'd pick. --- ## Option 3: arrow tip on the center — the one to use Put the tip of the arrow **exactly where you want the arrow to hit**. **Why it wins** - **Your aiming point is your impact point.** No mental arithmetic, no offset to remember. - **The target face can be any size and nothing changes.** Big face, small face, no face at all — a 3D animal with no scoring rings to reference — the tip goes where you want the arrow to go. - **Aiming off is clean.** You've still got the spot visible around the point as a reference for how far you're holding off. - **It matches the shot execution.** You're pushing tension and direction toward the same place the arrow is going. One intention, not two. **The one real objection** If you're fighting target panic, aiming directly at what you want to hit can be harder — the shot wants to break the moment you get there. But think that through. If you shoot a six o'clock hold, the bottom edge of the spot simply *becomes* your center. Target panic will attach itself to that instead, and you'll have exactly the same fight one inch lower. It isn't a reason to pick a worse aiming reference. It's a reason to deal with the panic directly — see [the target panic section in Trad 101 Part 2](/forum-thread.html?id=59fa9241-8688-4187-88a8-a6248999d6d9), which applies just as much to barebow target as it does to hunting. --- ## The short version Aim the tip of your arrow at the exact spot you want to hit. It survives changes in target face, works when there's no scoring ring at all, keeps your aiming off honest, and lines your execution up with your intention. The six o'clock hold is easier to like on day one and harder to live with by season three. --- ## Where to learn more Barebow is having a real moment and the coaching available for free right now is better than it has ever been. Worth your time: - **Jake Kaminski** — Olympic silver medalist, and his YouTube channel has an unusually practical run of barebow and string-walking content. He shoots what he teaches and shows his working. ([the aiming video this topic follows](https://youtu.be/LdtuU3qcrlo)) - **The Push Archery** — more hunting-oriented, but their shot-execution material is solid regardless of what you shoot at. - **RMS Gear** — good on form and the mechanics of a repeatable shot. **Shooting barebow and doing it differently?** Post below and say why — there is more than one right answer here and the reasoning is the useful part. *Related: [Traditional Archery 101 Part 1](/forum-thread.html?id=d0c4e21a-369a-4a0c-9a00-6d55526f1f2c) covers aiming methods generally, gear and getting started.*