MEDELLIN, Colombia – Through hard fought matches in grey, rainy skies at the first stage of the World Cup this morning, Brady Ellison and Braden Gellenthien secured spots in this weekend’s gold finals, while World Cup Rookies Alexis Ruiz and Tate Morgan are both going for bronze. With the winners of each stage of the World Cup automatically qualifying for the Final this fall, there's a lot riding on the gold medal matches.
Matches started out tough – the 1/16th round started the day with USA’s Casey Kaufhold, Mackenzie Brown, Erin Mickelberry, Matt Requa, Sophia Strachan, Jamie Van Natta and Breanna Theodore all exiting the competition early. With several other archers out before today’s matches began, Ellison became the last U.S. recurve archer standing, and Ruiz the last compound woman.
In the 1/8th, Gellenthien and 2nd seed Matt Sullivan went head to head in an epic USA showdown. Neither archer conceded, throwing perfect 30s down range to a 150-150 shoot off. Gellenthien clinched a hard win while teammates Kris Schaff and Tate Morgan sailed through with 147s in their respective matches. Ruiz’s impressive 148 outscored Denmark’s Damsbo while Ellison also advanced with a 7-3 victory over Spain’s Pifarre Trujillo.
In the quarterfinals, it came down to final arrows across the field. Ellison took a narrow 6-4 win, Ruiz posted another 148 to Spain’s Marcos’ 145 and all three compound men took their matches to shoot offs. Gellenthien overtook France’s PJ Deloche with and X. Schaff and France’s Boulch both threw down solid Xs on their first shoot off and went to a second arrow, where Boulch took the win. Morgan’s 9 was enough to advance and keep him in the game.
Meeting another USA teammate in the semifinals, Gellenthien went head to head with Morgan. With the most decorated archer in world cup history versus Morgan in his world cup debut-- experience won out as Gellenthien posted another perfect 150 to Morgan’s 146. In a classic, exciting matchup, Ellison faced the Netherlands’ Sjef Van den Berg in the semifinals and the two battled in tight competition. Ellison posted 148 points over five sets to take the 6-4 win and go for gold this weekend. Ruiz finished her semifinal match behind the Netherlands’ Vermeulen and will shoot for compound women’s bronze.
Competition continues this afternoon with team elimination matches through the semifinals. Scores are live at www.worldarchery.org. The medal finals will be available live this weekend on NBC’s Olympic Channel at www.olympicchannel.com/live.
Photo by World Archery.
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