Actualités

Jingyi tops Chinese one-two-three finish in recurve women category at Puebla 2026

12 avril 2026

Puebla, Mexico

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Yu Qi, Zhu Jingyi, and Huang Yuwei waving to the crowd on the podium at Puebla 2026.

It was a fine day for China as Zhu Jingyi topped an all-Chinese recurve women individual podium at Puebla 2026 - the first stage of the 2026 Hyundai World Cup - beating teammate Yu Qi for her maiden international solo gold medal.

The history was already made on Friday morning when Jingyi, Qi and Huang Yuwei made it into the final four, becoming the first ever trio from the country to make it onto the stage at a World Cup with all-Chinese semifinals only avoided due to Jingyi meeting Zhong Qixuan in the quarterfinal.

Whoever is in the team, Chinese archers always stress the heightened importance of team events more so than individual honours, but the story of the day has to be focused on the Gwangju 2025 runner up Jingyi who was in scintillating form at Zocalo de Puebla, winning all three of her possible gold medals on Sunday - recurve women team, mixed team and individual.

She dropped just one set across her two matches - it being against bronze medallist Yuwei in the semifinal [6-2] - and ended her tremendous campaign in Puebla with a perfect end to thrash Yu Qi 6-0.

“I feel like everything wasn't real, and the procedure was very difficult, but I tried to focus on myself and never give up,” said Jingyi, whose hands were shaking with excitement afterwards. “Until the very last moment, nobody can say for sure. Every end is the same. This end [the 30 at the end] was not special. I just try to focus on what I'm doing.”

“Over the years, our continuous efforts to break through our own limits, the support of our coaches in various training programs, and the care and assistance from our leaders have strengthened our confidence.”

China have been Korea's greatest rivals in recent years in the recurve women team event, with the two nations meeting twice last year in gold medal matches at Shanghai and Madrid [stages two and four of 2025] and also at Les Invalides in Paris 2024 two years ago.

Zhu Jingyi aiming against teammate Yu Qi in the recurve women final at Puebla 2026.

Li Jiaman was the only archer to feature in all three, but after three consecutive seasons, the Hangzhou 2022 Asian Games bronze medallist - who has been China's most consistent performer in that time - did not make the four archer recurve women cut.

She has flown the flag for China but Jingyi broke out of the shadow in Gwangju when she reached the World Championship final, coming up short to an in form - and one of Korea's many modern-day greats - Kang Chaeyoung that day 7-3.

A dominance such as three golds in one day though is something not even Jiaman has mustered yet and at 19 years of age the world is Jingyi's oyster.

Korea is coming however.

Their intense national trials will have been finished by the time Shanghai - stage two - comes around next month and it will be interesting to see how much Jingyi has grown from then against any of Korea's best in a potential medal match.

But this time it is on her turf.

“Even though I didn't get to win, I'm still very happy about it,” Jingyi responded about the difficulty of losing the title of world champion last year. “In the process, I'm constantly learning and improving myself, so that any mistakes made by the shots can be corrected in subsequent training.”

The new energy of 18 year old Yu Qi as well - whose silver and gold in the team is an impressive return in her first World Cup - is another aspect to watch and she too could pose the Koreans a challenge this season.

Brady Ellison also emerged victorious in the recurve men category, with Sunday being his 20th World Cup final four.

He and Jingyi have booked themselves into the World Cup Final later this year, which returns to Mexico in September, but there are still three more stages for archers to get their tickets to Saltillo with Shanghai next up on the tour, beginning on 5 May.