RICHMOND, Virginia – The 136th USA Archery Target Nationals wrapped day two of shooting under bright sun. Scores were tight and competitive; with the first competition back in almost a year, it was impressive to see such incredibly strong performances.
On the senior recurve men’s field, Brady Ellison and Jack Williams broke the senior and junior double 70m round world records (pending official verification), with 1356/1440 and 1337 respectively. “The fact that we shot world records on this field with the wind conditions we had this week is kind of crazy,” commented Ellison. I think if it was calm, we would have been pushing the 700 pace with how we shot this weekend. It was pretty awesome to come out here with 8-15 mph winds, sun, rain and every other which direction of wind blowing and shoot how we did.”
“It was definitely tricky switching back and forth and we figured it out and we’re ready,” added Williams. “Having that break was a good mental reset, but coming back to competition, it feels good to be back in what’s right and what’s normal.”
In the afternoon, James Lutz smashed the compound senior men’s world record with a 1422. He commented: “This weekend has been awesome, as usual, I had a great time shooting on the line with all the guys. The wind was tricky, but a lot of people shot a lot of great scores and I managed to keep a lot of them in the middle, so that definitely helped me. The bow is shooting unreal right now, my arrows are flying straight, and I couldn’t be happier with how my equipment is performing.”
World Archery recently introduced world records for barebow archery, and the U.S. has been setting and breaking records in the past few weeks with hot competition already. Christina Lyons also broke the barebow senior women’s double 50m round, scoring a 1227. Lyons shared: “I really was just competing against myself; I went out there to work on my mental game. When I go to shoot with other archers, I think of it as competing with them, and against myself to win the mental game. A lot of work and great coaching, a lot of hours and dedication have gone into this.”
John Demmer III, who broke several world records just days ago, took the top spot for the barebow senior men today: “The pressure is a little different now because it can possibly mean even more,” he commented. On returning to competition he added: “I took a little break, healed up a little bit, just started training fairly hard about five weeks ago; it was a slow start, but things are going really good right now.”
Toja Ellison, in her first event competing for U.S. ranking, took the top compound senior women’s spot just edging out World Field Champion Paige Pearce and Linda Ochoa-Anderson in a tight race to the finish.
Casey Kaufhold topped the recurve senior women’s division to defend her National Title over Catalina GNoriega and Mackenzie Brown.
In the recurve master men’s 50+ division, Tom Stevenson edged out Guy Gerig for the win on X count after tied scores, while Tatyana Muntyan notably won for the women by 65 points. The recurve Masters 60+ national champions are Thomas Hardin and Janet Thelen, and James Kerrigan is the Masters 70+ national champion.
Timothy Gillingham pulled ahead with a strong lead in the compound Master men’s division and Alanna Dunaway ran away with the women’s title by 40 points. Catherine Belzner, who competed in both compound and barebow is the national champion for the compound masters 60+ division with a lead of over 100 points, and John Dumar takes the title for the men. David Wright won the 70+ division by over 250 points.
World Record holder Rick Stonebraker and Tracey Francis topped the barebow Masters competition.
Kevin Mather also pulled double duty this weekend, competing in the para recurve and compound open divisions, winning the recurve open title. World Champion Ben Thompson clinched the compound open title for the men, and Tink Wallace was the winner for the women.
Complete results are available at www.betweenends.com. Competition continues tomorrow with the U.S. Open. The senior gold medal matches will be live streamed by Competition Archery Media on CAM and USA Archery’s Facebook and YouTube pages. Check out our online photo gallery and join the conversation this week with #OutdoorNationals.
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