Preview: World ranking points on offer at Veronica’s Cup in Slovenia

The legend of Veronica, the countess of Kamnik, is that she rejected priests who asked for money to build a church for the local peasant population and subsequently turned into a snake. She’s something of a tourist draw for the Slovenian city.

With contrasting generosity, the mission of the Veronica’s Cup’s is to reward archers looking to break into the top levels of international competition.

The three-day tournament is a popular stop for local national teams and independent athletes. This is an open entry event, although still worth world ranking points.

France, Denmark and Slovenia all have their squads in force. Amanda Mlinaric of Croatia is among the biggest other names on the entry list. She’s medalled at two world ranking events in Europe already this year and looks set for an impressive season.

The weather forecast is not looking good for the next couple of days in Kamnik.

Key information

What’s happening? A world ranking event on 7-9 May in Kamnik, Slovenia.

What’s at stake? World ranking points.

What’s the story? The focus of the international calendar moves to Europe from late May – these archers are preparing for stages of the Hyundai Archery World Cup in Lausanne and Paris, plus the European Championships and final Olympic qualifiers.

Schedule

• Friday 7 May: Qualification
• Saturday 8 May: Eliminations
• Sunday 9 May: Finals

How to watch

World Archery will stream the individual finals live on its YouTube channel at 15h00 CET on Sunday 9 May. Live scores will be available on the World Archery website and there will be coverage on World Archery’s digital platforms throughout the competition.

The Danes

Demark’s Maja Jager was the first archer to be officially selected for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. That happened way back, before the pandemic hit and the Olympics were delayed 12 months.

She’s in Kamnik with the Danish recurve women’s team in force.

Having sent a full team to London 2012, Denmark didn’t qualify a single quota place four years later. That monkey’s already off the back for Tokyo – but there’s only one last opportunity to upgrade Maja’s one quota to a three, in Paris in June, and the squad is seemingly letting no opportunity to prepare go to waste.

Who’s competing?

These are the top-ranked archers shooting at the Veronica’s Cup:

• Recurve men: Gasper Strajhar, Slovenia (world rank: 48)
• Recurve women: Maja Jager, Denmark (world rank: 21)
• Compound men: Nico Wiener, Austria (world rank: 49)
• Compound women: Amanda Mlinaric, Croatia (world rank: 21)

A total of 147 archers from the national teams of the following 18 countries, plus independents, are registered for this tournament: Austria, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Israel, Latvia, Luxembourg, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, Sudan and Slovakia.

Competition at the world ranking event in Kamnik starts with qualification on Friday.