I couldn't help but comment here on something I read on XYZ site. There's a posting on 97 fp of K.E. and how amazing that is. The comments go from "elephant" bows to whatever. If you take the guys set up he's getting 66lbs. of "Hit Force" from his ultra magnumzinger bow and I'm getting 63lbs. out of my recurve! I guess the thing that got me was the fact that all it was about was speed, speed, speed. When we recurve/longbow shooters look at hit force coming from a silent string. Just thinking.
A lot of it comes down to the archers purpose.
For 3D and field archery I still feel a faster arrow offers an advantage in that there is less gap, crawl, whatever between yardages so your distence estimation is not as critical. But a lot of this comes down to shooting/aiming style.
For hunting I think weight is more important then speed, esp for the yardages most of us hunt. A baseball traveling 180fps is just going to do more damage then a wiffle ball going 300fps. Speed is nice but I think the benefits of a slightly heavier arrow outweigh (no pun intended) a lighter fast moving arrow.
Neither is more important then having a well tuned arrow. IMHO
All I need is a 50# bow that can fling a 600grain arrow 300fps and I'll have the best of everything. :bigsmyl: (Hey, I can dream can't I?)
I think my 160fps pushing a 650+ arrow is great for me... It puts meat on the table.
I'm waay more critical about sound than speed and use the same set up for 3D and hunting except for the points of course.