Canada and India in Compound, Korea and France in Recurve

After the Cadets in the morning it was their elders’ turn to take up the field in another hot afternoon in Merida. In another exciting series of head-to-head finals, the Juniors were deciding on the gold and bronze medals in each of the four categories (CJW, CJM, RJW and RJM).   Compound Junior Women In the first match of the afternoon, the already experienced young American Erika Anschutz left no chance to her opponent from Great Britain Danielle Brown shooting nothing else than 9s and 10s with all her twelve arrows. Brown, coming to the field on a wheelchair, was however standing up to shoot. Although fulfilling a very good match, the two 7s she shot in the last two ends put an end to her last illusion to win a medal here in Merida. Anschutz took the bronze on the final score of 113-104.   It is amazing the young Canadian Doris Jones could even compete in this event when one knows that she broke her release finger in a car accident less than two weeks ago! Seeded 7th after qualification, she succeeded in winning all her matches up to the very last. In the gold final she made the difference in her sixth and ninth arrows scoring two 10s while her opponents shot 7s. At the end she wins the title with an advantage of 6 points (109-103).   Compound Junior Men The left-handed American archer Paul Tedford was facing the Indian Palton Hansda for the Compound Junior Men’s gold. Trailing by 3 points, Tedford finished his match with a perfect last end (30 out of 30!) putting pressure on his adversary. Hansda needed a 9 to tie the match on his last arrow, but a 10 would have him become the new champion… He did it, to win 113-112!  In the bronze medal match the Danish Patrick Laursen also shot a perfect last end, but it time it was not enough to beat the other American John Fleury who shot 9-10-10 to clinch the match with a 1-point advantage (113-112).   Women Recurve Junior In this category the first four seeded competitors were present in the bronze and gold finals thus showing that their ranking in the qualification was justified. Begul Lokluoglu from Turkey (no 3) and Elena Tonetta from Italy (no 4) were meeting each other to decide the bronze medal. This match looked like a hide-and-seek match with the leader changing all the time. At the end it was the Italian who picked up the medal on the score of 104-102.   For the title, the two Korean teammates Kim Soyun (seed 1) and Kim Sugyung (2) were facing each other. It seemed the first named archer would let her 1st place go to her dauphine, as she was trailing back the whole match until an unfortunate “miss” on the ninth arrow stopped Kim Sugyung from becoming Champion of the World (104-100).   Recurve Junior Men Two French were competing in the last two matches of these 9th Junior Outdoor World Championships. On the one hand, Thomas Aubert missed the medal by two points (106-108) in the bronze final where he was opposed to Florian Floto. The promising German thus added a new medal around his neck after the gold one he got with his team on the previous day.   However, France had another chance to cheer up in next and very last match with Romain Girouille facing Prabhat Kandir from India. After a strong start (9-9-10), the Indian could not hold his form any longer shooting three 7s almost in a row and leaving the advantage to his adversary. Girouille proved steadier on this match to offer himself and his country a Junior World Title (107-101).    Summary of the matches RJM/Gold: Romain Girouille /FRA 25-50-78-107 over Prabhat Kandir /IND 28-51-75-101  RJM/Bronze: Florian Floto /GER 27-53-80-108 over Thomas Aubert /FRA 26-53-79-106 RJW/Gold: Kim Soyun /KOR 24-52-78-104 over Kim Sugyung /KOR 26-53-71-100 RJW/Bronze: Elena Tonetta /ITA 27-51-80-104 over Begul Lokluoglu /TUR 26-54-79-102 CJM/Gold: Palton Hansda /IND 28-56-85-113 over Paul Tedford /USA 28-54-82-112 CJM/Bronze: John Fleury /USA 30-57-84-113over Patrick Laursen /DEN 28-55-82-112 CJW/Gold: Doris Jones /CAN 26-54-82-109 over Laura Longo /ITA 26-51-76-103 CJW/ Bronze: Erika Anschutz /USA 29-57-84-113 over Danielle Brown /GBR 27-55-80-104     Ludivine Maitre Wicki FITA Communication