Greenmount as a venue has an exceptional advantage over other venues. It is the grounds of an agricultural college, and there for something more than grounds for a nice walk.

This course weaves what is a sculpted garden stroll in with the untouched creating a vivid contrast of sloping grass gardens and ivy consumed logs, murky funnels between trees and lanes of arching tree branches. Even within the prelude to autumn, the withering, vivid leaves seem to fall less on the paths and gardens, than they do within the forests or by the lakes.

From the start, even before you have registered, there is a mob of mallard ducks cruising curiously on their ethereal waters to see the turnout. Some even throw out that cackling, sarcastic quack of theirs to psych out some of the archers.

By the registration hut – filled with billboards on bird and foliage identification – a sparse collection of trees reign over the open lawns. Soft watery greens and subdued yellow sheets surround wide barks, pouring from branches.

From the outset, I was worried. For this competition I turned up without my shooting glove, and with a 40lbs flatbow there was a good chance my fingers would be nothing but gristle by the end of the day. Like any self-respecting 36-year-old adult, I went straight to my dad and managed to get a spare tab to work with. That embarrassing escapade aside, I set about seeing to a couple of the juniors from my club to make sure they had everything they needed.

For the day it was myself, my father who was coming off a shoulder issue, and Peter Gilmore. A trio of swan archers from Lough Cuan Bowmen.

I have known Peter for nearly as long as I have been doing archery and known him to sign up for every field round, north and south, he can find an entry form for. This archer personifies a physical resilience which puts, shall we say younger, archers like me to shame. Aside from his bow, which has to be a ton in weight, Peter overcomes and endures physical health issues to shoot both days of a field round, whilst often pushing and shoving his way into a podium position.

As we managed our way through the targets, a highlight included an arrow embedded in a tree, next to the blue shooting peg. Why is this significant? Because it belonged to a compound archer! Who knew they could miss? And goodness was it stuck.

This did work as a visual metaphor for the course. Unlike the pervious month, no one was walking away with a personal best, and you just took what few points you got on the target. Slopes may not have been present, however, to compensate, Ballyvally utilised the dark, shady spots, viciously so.