BELEK-ANTALYA, Turkey - The last ever World Archery Championship four-distance recurve ranking round was shot this morning in Belek-Antalya, Turkey. One important result of this past weekend's 50th World Archery Congress was the vote to hold the recurve qualification round only at 70 meters for all World Archery Championships. With representatives from over 90 member associations present, major changes and propositions for the future of archery were on the table.
As the US tends to follow suit with the standards set for international competition, these votes could have an impact on archery here in the near future. Other major changes included applying the Set System to all recurve elimination matches (indoor, outdoor, team, mixed team, etc.) and applying cumulative scoring to compound indoor head to head matches to more clearly differentiate between the two classifications. Additionally, Para-archery classifications were redefined to allow for more fair and intense universal competition, especially in team events.
The Congress continued with exciting video presentations on upcoming events, an explanation of the venue for Rio 2016, the proposal that won Japan the bid for 2020, plans for the 2015 Para-Archery World Championships in Germany, and an update on work being done for the next World Archery Championship in Denmark.
College students will be interested to hear that a newly announced agreement with FISU makes archery now a permanent fixture at the Universiade. Resultantly, as permanent sports in the University Games do not hold a separate world championship, 2016 will be the final University World Championship for archery.
The Congress resumed with the reelection of World Archery President, Prof Dr Ugur Erdener with 93 of 95 votes in his favor. All three Vice-Presidential candidates were also elected into office. USA's Greg Easton also achieved a majority of votes for a space on the World Archery Executive Board and will complete a four-year term, an honor for Easton and USA Archery.
Easton was also awarded a bronze plaquette for his work in organizing the Ogden World Cup from 2010-2012 and the Youth World Championships in Ogden in 2009.
The US earned the Women in Sports Award for bringing the most women to international competition in the past season.
The Nations Cup winners were also announced for greatest number of athletes participating in the World Cup series since 2011. The US won first, followed by Mexico and Italy. Countries were also recognized for top honors in each World Cup season. The United States had the best performances in 2011 and 2012 and the second best in 2013. India and France were runners up for 2011, Korea and Russia for 2012, and Korea took top honors this past season with Italy named the third most decorated country of the year.
The Congress concluded with a presentation to the delegates of medals from the 2012 Olympic champions.
The US was well represented and appreciated for great achievements in archery as a sport and as an athletic foundation. Historically a big leader in this sport, will the US keep up with these big changes coming up on the international scene? Already these changes are in effect around the world, including an adjustment in format for the World Para-Archery Championships in Bangkok.
For more on the World Archery Congress, visit www.worldarchery.org.
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