DUBLIN, Ireland - The team eliminations and finals for the World Archery Field Championships saw USA dominate the course today. The unique team competition for field consists of one recurve, one compound and one barebow archer from each division shooting head to head matches where each archer shoots one arrow at each of four targets of different sizes and distances. The scores are added together cumulatively and the higher scoring team advances. This morning the junior women's team picked up the first U.S. medal of the day winning bronze, and then both the senior and junior men's teams won major gold finals.
The junior women's team seeded 3rd to face Great Britain in the semifinals. The trio of Sophia Strachan, Miriam Trafford and Abigail Weir had an initial lead after the first end, but then dipped behind Great Britain who took the win. They then went on to face Sweden for the bronze where they took an early lead, up nine points by the second end, and twelve by the third, a clear lead and easy path to victory as they clinched a spot on the podium 47-37.
The junior men's squad of Collin Klimitchek, Mark Schlaudraff and Steven Collins had high scores for strong wins. Starting with a second place seed, they had a smooth 42-40 win in the quarterfinals over the home team from Ireland. They again took an early lead in the semifinals against Austria and increased their totals to advance 48-43 to the gold final. Like the junior women's team, the U.S. boys faced Sweden in the medal final, and had a good shot at the win. The team from Sweden had two misses and several low scoring arrows, allowing the impressive U.S. team to take the win 51-36.
The senior women's team of Heather Koehl, Jenifer Stoner, and Jamie Van Natta seeded 5th in qualification to face Slovenia in their first match. Slovenia took the win by a wide margin to advance.
The senior men's team, anchored by Brady Ellison, Dave Cousins and John Demmer III was well stacked for the win. All three qualified first individually, making them an intimidating force to be reckoned with. They knocked out Finland in the quarterfinal with a 55-49 win. They continued the U.S. win streak against Sweden, winning the semifinal 53-49 to advance to the gold final where they dropped only two arrows outside of the 5-ring to take a huge win 63-50.
Competition continues tomorrow with individual finals, where U.S. archers will be featured in nine medal matches. The finals will be streamed live at www.archery.tv. Complete scores from the competition can be found at www.worldarchery.org.
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