Vegas 2016: 10 Things you Need to Know

The famous Vegas Shoot has been growing year-on-year for over a decade. The 2016 edition is not only the biggest yet, but marks the 50th anniversary of the event and includes the Final of the Indoor Archery World Cup. Here’s what you need to know…

1. How it all works…

The Vegas Shoot lasts three days: Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Archers shoot 30 arrows a day, each day – making a total of 90. The top scorers, if it’s drawn, go to a shoot-down at the end of the Sunday for the prizes.

Archers shooting the championship divisions, who have also competed at an earlier stage of the Indoor Archery World Cup – it visited Marrakesh and Bangkok in late 2015 and Nimes at the start of ’16 – can qualify for the Indoor Archery World Cup Final. Sixteen athletes in each division – compound and recurve, men and women – shoot matches on Saturday evening for Champion titles.

The World Archery Gala, where the Athletes of the Year are announced, runs on Friday evening.

2. The. Biggest. Ever.

With a day left of registration – and people do register late at the event – the competitor list totalled 3,050. That’s an incredible number and over 500 more than the 2015 competition. It’s the right year to break all records, too. Vegas 2016 is the 50th anniversary of the world famous tournament.

3. Live: Archery TV

One of the most popular live streamed tournaments on the calendar, Archery TV – the official YouTube channel of World Archery – shows the World Archery Gala, Indoor Archery World Cup Final and The Vegas Shootdown, all for free!

Visit Archery TV

4. Money, Money, Money

It’s not just the biggest shoot in Vegas in terms of competitors, but for payouts, too! The winner of the compound men’s championship competition in 2016 will pick up USD$100,000. The total prize fun: Over USD$300,000.

Not all the prizes are pure cash. The NFAA Foundation also awards USD$24,000 in scholarships to young, promising archers from around the world.

5. The Vegas Face

Unlike most World Archery indoor events, archers shoot at triangle triple spot targets at The Vegas Shoot. Normally, the three spots are aligned vertically, in a row. Compound archers also score the big (4cm) central ring as 10 points, like recurve archers, during the main tournament. In the shootdown, it switches to inner 10 (2cm).

Compound archers can also use larger arrows at The Vegas Shoot than at standard World Archery tournaments.

6. Three’s no crowd

The judging crew at The Vegas Shoot wear distinctive white and black striped referee uniforms. During the shootdowns at the end of the tournament, with so much money on the line, three “refs” check each line call on arrows – to make sure it’s truly the top archer that walks away with the prize.

7. Indoor tour finale

Last year in Vegas, Koreans Kim Jaehyeong, Jo Seunghyeon, Dutchman Mike Schloesser and the USA’s Erika Jones had individual gold medals in the Indoor Archery World Cup Final. With most of the Korean international team at a training camp in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Jones still on maternity leave, it’s only Schloesser with the chance to defend his title in 2015.

8. Lopez’s turn?

Two-time Archery World Cup Final Champion outdoors Sara Lopez made no effort to hide her dream to win the world’s biggest indoor events, to add to her admirable outdoor record. In 2014, she finished third in the compound women’s event. (Erika Jones won.) In 2015, she came second to Sarah Prieels.

Following the pattern… is 2016 her turn?

9. Young guns

Defending Champion Alex Wifler and the winner the previous year, Mister Perfect Mike Schloesser, were both under 21 when they took the compound men’s championship title in Sin City.

Each year, over a dozen archers that shoot a perfect 900 points over the three days, and shootdown for the biggest money prize in archery. It’s been the young guns that have come out on top the past few years. Is this the year the veterans take Vegas back?

10. 5o years, perfect record

There’s one man that’s never missed an edition of The Vegas Shoot. Bob Jacobsen shot in his first Vegas Shoot in 1966 at the age of 24 and has not missed a single one since. He gave an interview in The Vegas Shoot edition of the NFAA Magazine.

Bob won the tournament in 1974 and was the last person to win the freestyle unlimited category – which now translates to the World Archery compound discipline – with a recurve bow. He was also the first to win on the current style of target.

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