Coach Alex Meyer

Coach Alex Meyer

Hometown: Austin, TX
Year Began Coaching: 1995
Year Became JDT Coach: 2009
Coach Certification: Level 3 / Regional High Performance Coach
Age: 29
JOAD Club: Austin JOAD Archers (www.aajoad.com)

I began my archery career at 12 in New York City at Queens Archery and
progressively rose through the ranks as a JOAD competitor. In 1994, I moved to
Austin, Texas, and two years later I won Target Nationals, setting two national
records. In the following years competing as an adult I eventually was ranked
17th nationally. During my development as an archer I started coaching at 15
since there was no one else to coach the local JOAD.
Over the past 13 years we have grown from one 2-hour JOAD class to 6 classes
comprised of kids and adults with indoor and outdoor facilities and programs from
beginners to competitive.
Archery for me is a journey of self-discovery and a medium of knowing who you
are and what you are made of. It is as much of a sport as an art form. One of the
things I truly love is the freedom archery gives you, because in the end only you
have to answer to yourself, which can be a burden or liberating depending on
your perspective.
Coaching on the other hand gives me something you cannot receive from
shooting and that, in my case, is the ability to give back to others what I never
had as an archer. The ability to guide an archer from the local level to being a
world-class competitor, and to have those lessons and experiences permeate
throughout the rest of one’s life, regardless of what other endeavors they may
pursue in the future.