Warm Weather is Here / Archery Season in Toronto!

The 14 day weather forecast shows there being a slight dip in temperatures starting Wednesday until Saturday of this week, and then it getting a lot warmer in a hurry on March 1st.

By March 4th it will be 5 degrees outside and sunny.

For Toronto's Archery Community this means a return to shooting outdoors regularly, and seeing friends many of us haven't seen since October or November. (Sadly archery is very much a seasonal sport, even for private indoor locations the sport is largely seasonal.)

Speaking for myself I have been missing archery during the Winter so it is going to be a joy to be shooting again very soon.

The Toronto Archery Range on a Cloudy Day

Browse my archery lessons page to learn more about rates / discounts.

Read my archery lesson plan so you understand what you could be learning. Eg. Want to learn how to shoot long distances? Sign up for at least 3 lessons.

Lesson 1 - Short Distance Field Archery.
Lesson 2 - 20 Yard Target Archery.
Lesson 3 - Long Distance Field Archery.
Lesson 4 - Moving Targets.

Want to learn more about what is involved? Just email cardiotrek@gmail.com with any questions.

Happy Shooting!

4 Need To Know Things Before Your Weight Loss Journey

4 Things You Need to Know Before Setting out on Your Weight Loss Journey

Guest Post

How many of us have woken up on a Monday morning telling ourselves that the “diet starts today”, only for it to be ruined by lunch time? We have all been there, and the more we try and force ourselves to get through fad and crash diets, the less likely we are to stick to it. Losing weight isn’t easy, and with processed and high in fat food being so easily accessible, it is very common to fall into bad eating habits that can seem impossible to get out of.

However, it is important that you look after your weight, as being overweight can cause an increased risk of suffering from life threatening conditions, such as diabetes and high blood pressure. Therefore, we have put together some of the things you need to know before setting out on your weight loss journey that may help you along the way.

Starving Yourself Won’t Work

First of all, don’t make the mistake of thinking that if you starve yourself and dramatically cut down the amount of food that you eat each day, you are going to suddenly drop two dress sizes. In reality, those who follow crash diets are much less likely to continue with their journey as they give in to the temptation of high calorie foods.

Instead of cutting down the amount of food you eat, you should plan three healthy meals a day that are both nutritional and tasty. Nobody wants to eat just salad for the rest of their life, and thinking that you can is not going to work. So, stop thinking about the bad foods you can’t eat and focus on the good foods that you can!

Get into The Right Mindset

If you can get yourself into the right mindset that is needed to see you through a successful weight loss journey, then you are already halfway there. When we start a diet at the beginning of the week, many of us don’t take it very seriously, which is why it rarely lasts past lunch time. So, start by telling yourself that you are ready to make the changes to your diet and transform how you feel about yourself.

Decide Your Why

While a medical professional would tell you that your main motivation for losing weight should be for health reasons, there may be a variety of other reasons that have you led you to your weight loss journey. While losing weight for the benefit of your health will likely be a considerable factor, you may decide that you want to feel good about yourself again, something that has been unobtainable to you since gaining the weight.

You may even have a special event coming up that you want to look good and feel comfortable for. Whatever it is, decide your why and focus on it to keep your motivation up.

There Are Extra Tools Out There to Help You

Remember that you don’t have to struggle through your weight loss journey alone, and there are extra tools and resources out there that will be able to you through. You may be interested in weight loss groups or HGH injections that can boost energy levels, so make sure you should consider the online purchasing options available to you.

The decision to start your weight loss journey can be both daunting and anxiety provoking, and it is important to remember that it is completely normal to feel nervous about trying to lose weight. However, by following these tips and advice, you can start off on your successful weight loss journey.

Women's Boxing Achieves a New First in Vancouver

The first-ever all-women's boxing fight card in Vancouver has been a success.

Organizers for the event say never before has there been a boxing event that had only women fighters on the program, known in the sport as a fight card.

How many more decades will we have to wait to see live women's boxing events on television, cable, Netflix, etc?

I think it is unfortunate that this is an untapped source of sports entertainment and that nobody (not even the greedy gambling industry) has realized the potential for this as entertainment.

Archery Products on Etsy

The best places to buy archery products are typically in a bricks and mortar store, followed by the various archery websites which ship such products (including both Amazon and eBay), and then there is one website that few archers ever discuss.

Etsy.

So the problem with Etsy is that the products on there are made by 3rd parties who may have wildly different standards for what they are making and selling.

A quick search on Etsy for "archery" garnered 24,067 results as of January 31st 2020.

By the time this post goes live on February 4th 2020 there will probably be more than that. 24,100? Maybe.

The first thing I did after doing that search was click the option to Sort By Top Customer Reviews.

This way I could see what products are super popular and people really like them.

One of the first items I saw was a two-in-one armguard with bow glove, designed for use with longbows or horsebows (shown below) with 717 reviews. It is not the most highly rated item on there, but I can see why it is ranked so high. And it comes with a bonus shooting tab.

Downside: It was $83 CDN.

 Now you may recall I purchased a similar two-in-one armguard and bow glove last year and did a post about it. I got it off Amazon.ca for a mere $19.99 CDN.

No shooting tab that came with it, but I have been very happy using it and very happy with the quality.

This one looks nice with the black and brown leather layers, but colour is just about aesthetics. I don't see anything that makes it functionally better or worse than the one I purchased from Amazon.

I also saw the following things on Etsy worthy of mention:

• A bow rack / arrow rack for $300 with 90 reviews.
• Bow gloves.
• Finger gloves.
• Tabs.
• Quivers
• Thumbrings for horsebows.
• Replacement nocks.
• Overpriced longbows with a dubious number of 5 star reviews.
• LARP arrows.
• A variety of archery themed shirts with varying numbers of reviews.
• Jewelry.
• Pants.
• An annoying number of ads for firearm holsters, decorative hunting knives, slingshots and other things that are off topic for what I searched for...

By the end I was getting the impression that all of these products have an annoying number of 5 star reviews that they must be faking it. No product ever gets that many 5 star reviews.

So I have to conclude that the reviews must be fake. Completely bogus.

So that armguard above, did it really get 717 reviews? I admit it seems like an awfully big number, but if they are all faking it then perhaps it is really easy for people to fake the reviews.

And then I found out a fault in the reviews system...

The number being shown wasn't for the product. It was for SELLER. The seller had a total of 717 reviews. It isn't for the individual product at all.

When I went back and checked the armguard a second time I saw there was only 53 reviews for that specific armguard.

And everyone, for whatever reason, only seems give a 5 star review.

So it might as well just be a Thumbs Up/Down system.

So now I am skeptical about the whole idea of buying anything off Etsy with respect to archery equipment. I cannot trust the review system whatsoever.

To say nothing of the puffed up prices.

Amazon and eBay both have their faults too, but I think my preference will continue to be to shop at brick and mortar stores. I would have to see something truly special on Etsy to want to buy anything on there. And I don't see anything particularly spectacular.

Toronto Archery Lessons, 2020

My 50 lb horsebow balanced on three arrows.

February 1st 2020.

Spring is coming and I am looking forward to teaching archery again soon. March is almost here, but first we need to get over the "cold weather hump" that is February.

In the meantime I have been taking archery lesson bookings for Spring and Summer 2020.

If you are looking for archery lessons during the 2020 season I recommend booking now so you can get the best time slots before I become fully booked on certain days / specific months.

To book archery lessons in Toronto start by emailing cardiotrek@gmail.com and state whether you prefer weekday or weekend lessons, and how many you are looking for. Browse www.cardiotrek.ca/p/archery-lessons.html for my rates and discount packages.

Whoops, hit the nock on this one shot on the left. Cannot complain about the accuracy.

Availability will be limited as I am still a stay-at-home dad while my wife works on her law career.

However on the plus side, with my son getting older I am hoping to be spending more personal time at the Toronto Archery Range so my son can do more archery.

During the winter I have been teaching him how to use a toy crossbow in the comfort of our living room, but I look forward to warmer weather when we can get outside and he can try the real thing with a children's recurve bow I have waiting for him.

In unrelated news I saw the following archery themed wall hook at Michael's recently and took a photo. Unfortunately I have no use for such a thing currently, but maybe if the wife and I purchase a home someday we can buy six of them for storing coats on.

You know you are true archery fanatic when you start decorating your home with archery themed items.

This is the true danger of learning archery and falling in love with the sport. You start buying archery things and obsessing about anything connected to the sport.