What's the Difference between 50m and 70m?

(Or: “Why does the target suddenly shrink like it’s been left in a hot wash?”)

Five points if you said 20 metres. Minus ten if you said it smugly. And if you’re the sort of literalist who shouted “20M!” before the question was finished, you owe us 200 reversals and a long, reflective walk to the car park.

But you get ten points - and a knowing nod - if you said: “There’s no difference.”

Confused? Don’t be. A steely‑eyed, ice‑in‑the‑veins archer, already knows the truth. But not everyone is a fully‑fledged toxophilite with a raging case of equipment‑related OCD like our editor. So settle in. We’re going to explain why 50m and 70m are basically the same experience wearing different sized hats.

“You keep saying that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

World Archery rounds are measured in metres, and face sizes are regulated by distance. In the main:

• 50m and under → 80cm face
• Beyond 50m → 122cm face

I'm fine with this but my sight is confused!

In multi‑distance rounds like the WA1440, you shoot 70m and then 50m back‑to‑back. And here’s the twist: They look the same. They feel the same. They score almost the same.

Why? Because when the boss moves closer, the face shrinks. When the boss moves further away, the face grows. The visual experience - the thing your brain actually uses to aim - stays almost identical.

We even snapped a picture on a random club night. No prep. No lighting. No massive CGI budget - blame the board for that. Just two targets sitting there looking suspiciously alike. If you squint, they’re basically twins. But if you don’t trust us or your lying eyes, don’t worry. We brought maths.

“These are small… but those are far away.”

Time for trigonometry. Don’t panic - this is the friendly, archery kind. No one’s getting graded. No one needs to cry in a toilet cubicle.

To compare how “big” a target appears at different distances, we measure the angle it occupies in your field of view. That angle is determined by:

• the actual width of the face
• the distance to the target
• the right‑angled triangle voodoo your maths teacher definitely tried to explain while you were doodling bows and arrows dreaming of Olympic gold.

Using basic trigonometry, we can calculate the angle from the centre of the face to its edge - the “half‑width angle”.

Here’s what we get:

• 80cm face at 50m → 0.458°
• 122cm face at 70m → 0.499°

That’s a difference of 0.041 degrees.

To put that in archery terms: It’s the difference between “identical” and “identical but you’ve had a coffee". If you drew both angles on paper, you’d need a microscope and a day off work to tell them apart.

“Six of one, half a dozen of the other.”

Chancel window in the abbey of Saint Clickerus, Patron Saint of Hesitation

So the maths says they’re basically the same. But what about real‑world shootie?

Pretty much the same there too.

Archers often get spooked when they come down from 70m to 50m and see the smaller face. It feels like someone’s stolen 42cm of target while they weren’t looking. (Yes the field party hates you but no it wasn't them!) This is just psychology doing psychology things.

In practice:

• The view through the sight is almost identical
• The flight time is shorter at 50m, making shots slightly more forgiving
• The face is smaller, punishing sloppy execution
• These two things cancel each other out like a board meeting where everyone disagrees but no one wants to go home late

Net result? Scores at 50m and 70m are usually within a handful of points. One GA archer - a man who tracks his scores with the dedication of a medieval monk illuminating manuscripts - has PBs just four points apart.

Four. That’s one unexpected gust of wind or one “oops”.

So what’s the takeaway?

If you can shoot 70m, you can shoot 50m. If you can shoot 50m, you can shoot 70m. The distances are different, but the experience is basically the same. Unless you’re shooting 28lb and suffering at seventy - but we covered that in a previous article, and we know your gym has already sent you a "missing you" card. Go see them soon.

So next time you walk up to shoot a 50m end and feel your stomach drop at the sight of that tiny 80cm face, remember: It’s not smaller. It’s just closer. You had 70m down. You’ve got 50m too. Now stop panicking and go shoot the thing.

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Calculator.net can show you the maths for the above calculations.
Other Patron Saints of the Missed Golds are Saint Stephanie the Organized; Saint John of the Fallen X10; and Saint Compoundius, who insists it’s “still archery, technically.”