Spain’s junior women secure bronze at home youth world championships

Elia Canales, Monica Galisteo and Maria Pitarch beat Ukraine’s Yevheniia Chybisova, Zhanna Naumova and Sikalo Yelyzaveta in a tiebreaker to win the recurve junior women’s team bronze medal on home soil in Madrid at the 2019 World Archery Youth Championships.

“As we are home and there’s a lot of people supporting us, it’s more exciting to win,” said Pitarch. “This bronze means the end of a very long season and the reward of the good job we have done, especially the teamwork.”

The local squad was 4-0 up after two sets. Then the Ukrainians fought back.

Scoring sets of 56 and 54 points to Spain’s 50 and 53, Ukraine tied the match at four points each and forced a shoot-off.

Ukraine shot nine, eight and seven for a total of 24 points.

Monica, Maria and Elia: 10, nine and an eight – enough for 27 points in total and victory, giving the home crowd on the hill behind the eliminations range something to cheer about.

There were tears of happiness on all three girls’ cheeks.

“During the shoot-off, we were thinking lots of things, but mostly that we could make it, and that we needed to calm down,” said Monica. “We have helped each other a lot. We have felt great and we are thankful for all the support we have had.”

Spain beat Italy and the USA, both 6-2, but fell to Korea by the same score in the semifinal to make the bronze medal match.

First and second seeds Korea and Chinese Taipei will shoot for gold on Sunday in front of Madrid’s Royal Palace.

The recurve junior men’s team bronze medal went to the Netherlands, represented by Gijs Broeksma, Jonah Wilthagen and Damian Vaes. The Dutchmen beat Ryan Pinder, Jacob Reid, Alexander Wise of Great Britain in four sets, 6-2.

“I’m fairly happy with it. I had a bit of a rough tournament but definitely, as a team, we could make up for the hiccups at whenever someone shot a bit less and I think that’s really nice, that’s what the team round is about,” said Wilthagen. “I’m very happy with this medal right now.”

Seeded 10th over qualification, Gijs, Jonah and Damian beat Kazakhstan, 5-1; Turkey, 5-3, and Chinese Taipei in a shoot-off with a better 28. They lost to Japan, 5-3, in the semis.

Korea and Japan will shoot in the recurve junior men’s team gold medal match.

The 2019 World Archery Youth Championships takes place on 19-25 August in Madrid, Spain.