UK Student Archery Association

Prieels QF leads Taipei way [30/Aug/17]

Review in brief of those British archers (and those from other countries at British universities) at Summer Universiade in the late August heat of Taipei.

In ladies compound, Edinburgh duo Hope Greenwood and Sarah Prieels (for Belgium) qualified in 6th in 8th on 683 and 682. The field was tightly bunched, with 689 in first place. Rebecca Blewett (Nottingham) was 38th on 658. Blewett lost out 136-141 to the Russian Aleksandra Savenkova (qual 27th). Savenkova then claimed her second British scalp in the round of 32, beating Greenwood, who had a first round bye but was unable to take her qualifying form in to the knock-outs. Sarah Prieels also had a bye in the first round, before sailing through her last 32 match by 10 clear points. She edged through the next round 143-141 before being undone by top seed and eventual bronze medallist So Chaewon from Korea 146-141 in the QFs.

In gents compound Andrew Brooks (Staffordshire) shot 662 to qualify in 44th, before going out 135-139 to the 21st seed.

In the compond team event, the British mixed team (Brooks and Greenwood) qualified 13th out of 20 but lost out against hosts Taiwan 150-146. Brooks, Greenwood and Blewett competed as a combined gents team, but qualified 16th out of 18 and lost to the top seeded Koreans. Neither the UK nor Belgium fielded a complete ladies compound team - a team of Greenwood, Prieels and Blewett would have qualified in 5th.

To underline the strength of the field overall, in ladies recurve, Choi Mi-Sun put a point on the world 720 record with 687.

As for the gents, Tom Hall (Warwick) scored 656 to land in 16th place, followed by Guy Matzkin (Edinburgh/Israel) 38th on 634, Ashe Morgan (Birmingham) 41st on 631, Vladimir Hurban (Edinburgh/Slovakia) 52nd on 621, with Jack Masefield (Derby) 65th on 596. The recurve KO format is slightly different with the top 8 qualifiers parachuting in to the last 32. This means that instead of going 128>64>32>16..., the early rounds go 96>48>24+8>16... In the round of 96/128 Jack Masefield drew his first two sets against his 48th seeded opponent before being edged out 6-2. Ashe Morgan won his match in this round very comfortably indeed 6-0 against the lowest ranked archer in the field, whilst Vladimir Hurban also came through unscathed. Tom Hall and Guy Matzkin received byes.

The next round, the round of 48/64 proved the end of the road however. Guy Matzkin took the first set but lost 7-3, whilst Vladimir Hurban never shot below a 26 and still lost in straight sets. Tom Hall and Ashe Morgan both suffered tie-break heart-break. Morgan led his match 3-1 and 5-3 before losing 9-8 in shoot off against a higher ranked Mexican opponent. Tom Hall began with a 30, but then slid 5-3 behind, winning the last end to force a shoot off. A 10 from his lower seeded Slovenian opponent sank his chances.

The UK's men's recurve team qualified 11th out of 20 teams, with 16 making the knock-outs, but lost 6-2 to 6th seeds Mexico.

The list of International caps has been updated to include the 2017 event. 2018 will be a fallow summer as archery finally makes the transition to compulsory Summer Universiade sport. Its first such inclusion will be in 2019, in Napoli.