Quote Originally Posted by Knaight View Post
If you're doing target shooting you'll still want a substantially better bow than one intended to be decorative. I'd recommend hitting up the archery range to figure out what your preferred draw weight is (if you buy an 80 pound bow and it turns out that you can't handle anything more than 60 you just wasted a fair amount of money), and then seeing about finding a bow afterwards.
Just to build on this a little, even 60lb is a fairly hefty weight for a beginner (remember that you'll be holding onto this weight with three fingers via a bit of string then drawing and releasing this multiple times), so in all likelihood you'll start off with something fairly light (30-40lbs) then go up in draw weight up as you improve.

I know it's difficult, but try not to let your ego dictate what draw weight you get. Being 'over bow-ed' or having a draw weight that's too heavy for you just means you have poor precision since you're struggling to hold the bow still at full draw and you'll get tired very quickly. While medieval war archers never held their bows at full draw for long, target archery is a different situation.

I've also heard horror stories of archers with completely inappropriate kit, like one had a bow so heavy for him, it took him and a friend to draw it. Also, make sure your arrows are long enough:

Spoiler: Ouch
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Yep, that's his hand trapped around the riser as he didn't notice his arrow falling off the rest before he loosed.