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What happened last time? A pre-Paris rewind to the World Cup stage in Berlin in 2019

12 juin 2021

Paris, France

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Eleven archers had already qualified for the Hyundai Archery World Cup Final in Moscow by the time we arrived at the fourth and last stage of the international circuit in 2019, which was held in Berlin.

The eventual circuit champions – Brady Ellison, Kang Chae Young, Mike Schloesser and Sara Lopez – were in attendance, though none of them took gold at that event in Germany.

Instead, Berlin instead served as a showcase for a new wave of talented competitors, as Mete Gazoz, An San and Alexis Ruiz announced themselves as archers to be reckoned with following their victories. For Gazoz, it was his second consecutive win in the venue.

During a 2021 international season that has been shortened from four stages to three, as is customary in Olympic years, Paris in two weeks represents the final opportunity to earn a ticket to this year’s edition of the season-ending event in Yankton – not to mention the final quota places for Tokyo 2020.

Will stage three introduce any new contenders to win in September, or will it serve as merely a final tune-up for the prestigious tournaments that follow?

Before we find out, let’s rewind back two years and recap Berlin 2019 in full.

Oh Jin Hyek shoots at the fourth stage of the 2019 Hyundai Archery World Cup in Berlin.

The top qualifiers

Recurve men: Oh Jin Hyek, Korea – 654
Recurve women: An San, Korea – 659
Compound men: Domagoj Buden, Croatia – 691
Compound women: Sara Lopez, Colombia – 687

Shooting as a member of Korea’s reserve team, Oh Jin Hyek topped an extremely windy recurve men’s qualification in his first international tournament of the year to lead the field with just 654 out of a possible 720 points. It’s not the kind of total we’d expect from the London 2012 Olympic Champion – which just serves as evidence of just how tricky the conditions were.

Oh’s score was actually tied with Chinese Taipei’s Kao Hao-Wen, but the Korean shot 33 10s to Kao’s 23 to secure pole position. He also paired with An San, shooting in her first senior international tournament, to rank first as a mixed team.

The winners

Recurve men: Mete Gazoz, Turkey
Recurve women: An San, Korea
Compound men: Evren Cagiran, Turkey
Compound women: Alexis Ruiz, USA

With her gold, Ruiz distinguished herself as the only archer to medal at all four stages of the circuit in her debut 2019 season – and cemented the number one spot in the world ranking. An San, making her debut on the senior national team, won as well. Gazoz showcased incredible shooting in tough conditions to win his second consecutive final in Berlin.

Alexis Ruiz shoots at the fourth stage of the 2021 Hyundai Archery World Cup in Berlin.

How the wins happened

Recurve men: Mete Gazoz beat Korean debutant Bae Jaehyeon in straight sets to successfully defend the gold medal he won at the same event in 2018. The phenom also won recurve men’s team gold with young Turkish teammates Ali Aydin and Samet Ak, shooting a perfect final arrow to decide the match. The latter victory was arguably more impressive.

Recurve women: An San defeated teammate Jeon Ina in straight sets to win gold in her senior debut, dropping just two points throughout the match as she shot sets of 29, 29 and a perfect 30 points to beat Jeon’s 27.6 average. It was a fitting end to an impeccable campaign in Berlin, as she seeded first after the windy ranking round and won all but one of her elimination matches without dropping a set point.

Compound men: Turkey’s Evren Cagiran beat Mike Schloesser of the Netherlands in a single-arrow shoot-off, 10 to nine, to take compound men’s gold – the second stage victory of his career after previously winning in Antalya in 2016.

Compound women: Alexis Ruiz beat defending stage winner Sophie Dodemont of France to win her first-career stage of the Hyundai Archery World Cup and cap an impressive debut season. Ruiz ascended to the number one spot in the compound women’s world rankings after the victory, having won bronze at the first two stages and silver at the third. With her gold, she became the only archer to medal at each of the four stages of the international circuit in 2019.

The best match

While the least prescient of the four individual winners in Berlin, Evren Cagiran owns the distinction of having won the best match of the fourth stage of the 2019 Hyundai Archery World Cup. Cagiran defeated Mike Schloesser with a near-perfect arrow, which hit the X, to win a shoot-off in the title match.

It didn’t just bring the stage win but meant Evren finally got the best of Mister Perfect, having lost all five of his previous matches against the world number one.

The ninth seed after qualification, Cagiran shot five ends of 29 in the final and totalled 145 points out of a possible 150.

After opening with a loose couple of shots, scoring 27 for his first end, Schloesser landed 11 perfect arrows. He had 137 points with one left to shoot – and needed a nine to win.

The wind gusted and Schloesser shot a good arrow. But it landed low, leading to a tiebreak.

Schloesser, shooting first, hit the middle of the nine, giving Caigran plenty of room to play with. But the Turk didn’t leave anything to chance, drilling the 10 for his second-career stage victory.