World Cup Stage 2 – Quotes of the Team Finals

  Recurve Men  Rahul BANERJEE (IND) – Team Gold Medal There was more water around the targets than last year and that made it difficult. The wind was changing but that was OK. The best news is actually that we beat Italy for the first time, in the semifinal. The only team we haven’t beaten is Korea. Let’s hope to make it at the world championships.   Recurve Women   Berengere SCHUH (FRA) – Team Silver Medal It was hard to adapt to the field of play, because there was more water around the targets than last year. But it is our first team medal since the beginning of the World Cup in 2006. We previously finished fourth a number of times. I am going to shoot for bronze later on in the individual matches. So, in the end the week was quite good!   On the personal side, we are doing some changes in my technique. The goal is to have a better draw, to lower the shoulder and to have everything aligned. We are always studying what can be improved. We have noticed areas for improvement from last year’s images, but we didn’t want to make changes before the Olympics. Now I have made my draw 1cm longer, but I have some trouble in feeling the clicker, so I get blocked and shoot too late. It creates some trouble, but we have time until the world championships in Ulsan to improve the move.   Yulia LOBZHENIDZE (UKR) – Team Bronze Medal This is the first medal for the Ukrainian women since the World Cup started! It’s such a great feeling to win as a team! Personally, I have had a good preparation this year and I hope I can be more successful in both team and individual events. I hope to build on the momentum of my eighth place in individual.   The training structure has not changed since Viktor (RUBAN) became Olympic champion. However, it feels great when you are standing beside him at practice in the shooting line. It’s cool to think you have an Olympic champion in the team. All the kids in the club come to him and want to achieve the same feat!   Compound Men   Anders MALM (SWE) – Team Gold Medal It has been a great week for me in Porec especially so early in the season. The beautiful weather helped as well and I got a boost in confidence with my good score in qualifications. Then I shot well in individual but Sergio PAGNI stopped me in the quarterfinal. He also beat us in the team final last year here in Porec. So it is sweet revenge this time! The final field is even more beautiful this year than last. The view of the marina is amazing.   Such a great archer like Morgan (LUNDIN) is always a backbone for the team, but I feel that the other two members are ready to step in and deliver the goods when it is needed.   Martin DAMSBO (DEN) – Team Bronze Medal I am glad we won the bronze today, because I was a bit disappointed with my individual result. Maybe next time, I should finish 64th in the qualifications instead of 1st (laughs). In this individual match, I got fooled by the wind. I shot a good group of arrows, but there were too many in the 9. At the end, I lost by one point. Here in the final field, the wind was also tricky. We should not watch the flags on the top of the targets but rather the windsock on the left side of the field and also the flats on top of the boats nearby. Once we figured out the wind, we shot well in the last two ends (58, 57) to win the match.   I am working part-time as well as competing in archery, but this year we really tried to put even more training in place. We would really like at least one team member to qualify for the World Cup Final in Copenhagen this year. We also want to shoot well in the mixed team there, since we are already qualified for this.   Compound Women  Albina LOGINOVA (RUS) – Team Gold Medal It’s a great come from behind victory! It is actually a celebration day in Russia today so we wanted to win. It was difficult because we shot for the first time with Viktoria BALZHANOVA in the team. She was a little a nervous. We actually all shot great in practice this morning but we did not start the match well. Personally, I did not shoot a good match today from a technical point of view. The special final field is not an excuse. The wind was not so strong and we just needed to adapt. I am glad we fought hard and we came back from behind to win this gold!   Irina MARKOVIC (NED) – Team Gold Medal When we compete, we actually get good results! I hope we have a team that qualifies for the world championships, but we need to go through an internal process and get a certain level of scores. Personally, I am looking for revenge because I was fourth in Leipzig two years ago.   Didier MIEVILLE FITA Communication