Colombia’s Sara Lopez named champion of first Lockdown Knockout
Colombian world number two Sara Lopez beat Norway’s reigning World Archery Youth Champion Anders Faugstad, 146-144, to become champion of the first Lockdown Knockout. The invitational event saw eight compound athletes from around the world compete remotely.
“I’m really happy because I knew it was going to be hard. I knew that he was going to shoot incredible,” said Sara. “I’m really happy also to be part of this. It is part of history and being able to shoot with all these incredible archers and represent all the women out there.”
“To be honest, I got a little frustrated at the beginning with the connection, I had a lot of help from my family and we were able to put this together and it was a great match.”
After first ends of 28 points from both archers, the connection to the remote video that Lopez was sending failed. The sunny and hot weather at her home in Pereira, a city in the foothills of the Andes, caused her devices to overheat.
But Sara’s brother and father were on hand. Sporting umbrellas to protect the cameras from the heat and with everything reconnected, the match resumed.
Despite the distraction, the reigning Hyundai Archery World Cup Champion was on point. She shot a perfect 30 in the second end and another in the third. Anders was not comfortable; he’d dropped four by the time he’d shot his ninth arrow and trailed, 88-86.
“I have this thing over my eye so that I don’t see double, but I moved it in the past round, so I saw double and I wasn’t sure where to aim. It was a bad shot,” explained Anders, pointing to the eye shield attached to the rim of his cap.
The Norwegian 20-year-old couldn’t recover the rhythm and consistency he displayed during the first two matches that saw him shoot 148 and 149 points in wins over Steve Anderson and Mike Schloesser.
As Lopez added light rain to the list of obstacles on the range in Colombia, she held off any charge from Anders in the fourth, matching his 29-point end and leaving things at 117-115.
Faugstad finished the same in the fifth, shooting 10, 10 and a nine.
At the targets, Sara needed to make a tight call on one of her last shots: “I have a 10, 10 and I don’t know but I would say it’s a nine, it’s really close.”
The five-time Hyundai Archery World Cup Champion took the match, 146-144.
“Thanks for putting this together, I had a lot of fun, I got my goal. Thank you all for participating. It was an amazing match and I was expecting it,” said Lopez, who then joked: “I really hope I can join again a competition like this, but I don’t know if I’ll get invited because of my WiFi.”
The victory secures Lopez a prize purse of 1000 CHF, which she has said she will donate to charities combating the COVID-19 pandemic in Colombia. Anders receives 500 CHF for second place.
“I didn’t really get into the groove but, that’s what archery is, sometimes you hit and sometimes you don’t,” said Anders. “Sara shot amazingly, so there’s not really much you can do when somebody that you shoot against is shooting so good, there’s no way you can catch up.”
It was announced during the match that the Lockdown Knockout will return for recurve archers in June.
The Lockdown Knockout is the first remote international event being streamed live across World Archery’s digital platforms.
