HAVE - A - GO

Archery is great fun and is a very sociable sport accessible to everyone young and old and everyone does love to ‘have-a-go.’ Health benefits can also include improved fitness and strength, a reduction in stress and anxiety and it also promotes self-esteem and emotional and mental well-being. But above all it is good fun, and everyone secretly loves scoring a gold.

Our Have a Go archery lessons are relaxed and a lot of fun. They are suitable for complete beginners and are mainly aimed at adults and young people, although we can cater for younger children. The sessions are a great way to try out Archery and get a real feel for our club.

We run regular Have-a-Go Archery sessions throughout the year. These sessions can be facilitated at our outdoor venue at Ards Rugby Club, or we can bring an Archery session to you, for a church or community activity, team building day, corporate event, school have a go or local fairs or even regular weekly clubs (Scouts, Guides etc).  We can run these sessions both indoors and outdoors. These sessions last around 1.5 hours and we provide all the archery equipment needed to run a fun and safe archery session using real bows and arrows. 

We can customise our set up to suit the venue, whether it is indoors, Sports, Schools, Community or Church Halls or outdoor spaces. If you have a venue in mind for a Have-a-go please get in touch and we can assess its suitability.

The Have-a-Go sessions are taught in small group with a maximum of 12-15 people being coached, (depending on the size of the venue) so that everyone gets plenty of one-to-one attention as well as part of the group, and in particular lots of shooting time! We ensure that everyone has the correct equipment and provide a short safety briefing and a demonstration of the correct shooting technique using appropriate recurve bows and shooting barebow. We then get everyone shooting safely and confidently, and then once everyone has ah plenty of practice, we will show you how to score, and then finish off the session with a fun competition.

• a local Community group, Church group, Youth group, Young people’s organisations. Sessions can run for anything from 50mins – 1.5hrs and generally with up to 12-15 participants per session. We are looking to host sessions for local health trusts (Key health workers), NI Fire and Rescue, Ambulance service.

• a school or college sports hall or field for a Have-a-go session. We generally work with children in a post primary setting (KS3-4-5), but for schools we can accommodate primary pupils in Key Stage 2 (P6-P7). Sessions can run for anything from 50mins – 1.5hrs and generally with up to 12-15 participants per session.

• you if you have a suitable indoor or outdoor space and provide have a go session for those attending your event where they can step up and shoot a few arrows before moving on to other stalls/events.

• a corporate away day and provide archery as an activity for the day with set time slots for a specific number of participants or as rolling style have a go archery session at multi-activity event days where participants can step up and shoot a few arrows before moving on to another activity. Archery is a fun and sociable sport ideal for a team building activity days; it can reduce stress and anxiety and promote both self-esteem and emotional well-being while giving immediate satisfaction to the participants as their arrow hits its target.