Great Head-to-Head Matches in the Individual Finals Day!

Recurve Women bronze medal: Stepanova (RUS)   The individual elimination phases took place today. With all targets at 70 metres, archers had to shot two ends of six arrows in each elimination match from 1/32 until 1/8. The format of the matches then changed to four ends of three arrows from the quarter-finals to the medal matches. Today the weather was friendlier, “only” 75% of humidity and around 25°C. It was a “cool sauna” for all the archers and organisers, but the wind was still present and kept changing direction and intensity all day long. From time to time the wind did calm down, however. Although these moments were quite rare, they were precious to archers, who suddenly shot good groups and better scores.    In the morning the competition started with the Recurve Men and Women categories. On the women’s side Ki Bo Bae (KOR) was unbeatable. She shot the highest score of the day in her division with 114 points in 1/16 finals. With 105, 108, 107 and 109 she moved to the gold medal match without too many problems. It is clear that Koreans know how to deal with wind… and Ki’s performance throughout the elimination matches proved it. Her teammate Chang, who was 1st in the qualification, was defeated in 1/4 finals by Stepanova (110-111). The young Russian then won the bronze medal against the local archer Yuan Shu-Chi in an exciting match (107-105). Silver was for Lee Hyun-Ju from Korea.      Recurve Men winner: Whang (TPE)In Recurve Men the favourite athletes advanced to the 1/4 finals rather easily. Whang (TPE), who finished 1st in the qualification, went to the gold medal match without facing any difficult match. With 111, 108, 110, 107 and 112 he won a deserved gold medal in this FISU World Championships. The final match was against his teammate, Kuo Cheng-Wei, who won silver with 106 points. Volunteers and local spectators cheered up this match, providing a good atmosphere in the field. Daniel Morillo (ESP) had more difficulties to reach the medal matches. His progression was good until he was defeated in 1/2 finals by Kuo (TPE) in a hard match (105-109). Morillo then lost the bronze medal match against the Korean archer Jang, who took the bronze medal with 113 points against 108. Morillo must now aim for the Olympic Games in Beijing, which will be his next competition.   The competition moved to the compound division. In Compound Men the archers battled match after match. The level was very high and, with “only” 12 arrows and a lot of wind, anything was possible. Proof was given by the French archer Sebastian Brasseur, who started very well the eliminations phases with 115 points, but found his first hard battle too soon. In 1/8 final against the Englishman Philip Glover, Brasseur was tied at the amazing score of 117-117! The drama of the “1-arrow” shoot-off started and both Glover and Brasseur shot a 9. Then the Frenchman shot a 10, but his opponent did not want to give up and also shot 10. Glover finally scored a 9 and Brasseur a… 1! Something happened in his shooting: wind or equipment? Brasseur lost the match and was “kicked out” of the competition. But the tie-break was a great show of excitement and control of the nerves.   Philip Glover shot really well and this result is not a surprise. He went to the gold medal match with 116, 117, 110 and 116 points. In the final he found a tough opponent, the talented American archer Jedd Greshock. Greshock appeared extremely “focused” in all his matches. He also looked relaxed, chatting with his teammates and coaches. Self-confident, he managed to go to the gold match with 117, 113, 114 and 106 points. In the final match Greshock (USA) beat Glover (GBR) by two points, in an exciting and interesting duel, full of suspense until the last arrow (112 to 110). The bronze medal was another surprise! The seeded no. 28 archer Mathieu Vanderpoele (BEL) wanted to make his own “history” in these championships. He started “waking up” with a tie at 115 points and a shoot-off in his first match against Abiduev (RUS). In the tie-break the Belgian won with an X10 against a 9 for his Russian opponent. Then he advanced with 113, 115, 105 and 108 points. He “landed” in the bronze medal match where he faced Nathan Cameron from Canada. Vanderpoele defeated the Canadian 111 to 109.   Compound winners: Anschutz and Greshock (USA)   In Compound Women one could guess the finalists even before the competition started: Korea and USA with two “warriors” Kwon Oh-Hyang against Erika Anschutz. Anschutz reached the gold final with 112, 110 and 112 points. She did not suffer any hard match in the whole day, winning with authority each of the previous elimination duels. Kwon only had a tough match in semi-final, where she won by one single point (113-112) against the strong Russian archer Albina Loginova. Therefore, the final was as expected. After 12 arrows Erika scored two more points than Kwon and won the gold medal. USA is still the strongest country in the world in the compound division, but other countries are getting closer and closer. This is the case of Korea on the women’s side. The bronze medal was for Loginova (RUS) who beat her teammate Viktoria Balzhanova 111 to 109. Russia is another country pushing very hard in the compound women categfory, and this is also visible in the University archery events.   At the end of the day the weather was warning the teams for the next day. It was not going to be sunny anymore and the weather forecast event foresaw rain… Let’s wait and hope not! The pictures of the day...   Juan Carlos Holgado FITA Communication