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World Cup rematch between Lopez and Ellison – but with a twist

22 avril 2022

Antalya, Turkey

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Colombia's compound mixed team at Antalya 2022

There will be a repeat of the compound women’s individual gold medal match from the 2021 Hyundai Archery World Cup Final between Sara Lopez and Toja Ellison at the very first stage of the 2022 circuit in Antalya, but with a twist – because they’ll face each other in the mixed team final.

Colombia’s Lopez and teammate Daniel Munoz, plus Slovenia’s Ellison, with partner Aljaz Matija Brenk, made it through to the gold medal match after eliminations today.

“I’m still trying to process what just happened,” said the 18-year-old Brenk, who (with Ellison) saw off Italy (154-153), the Netherlands (155-153) and India (157-156) on his way to the final. “Before the last arrow, I was just calm and then we won. It’s incredible. I’m so excited, it’s my first final so I can’t wait.”

Brenk paid tribute to the strong partnership being forged with Toja.

“We’ve really connected in the last year since we became a team and we’ve made some really big strides. I’m very happy for us,” he said.

Waiting for them in the Antalya arena will be Colombia, a duo that dispatched Germany (156-154), Chinese Taipei (158-154) and Croatia (155-154) to get to the gold medal match. Lopez cannot wait to renew acquaintances with Ellison again.

“Everyone is shooting great and all the mixed teams are incredible,” she said. "It will be a great match [against Slovenia] and we know how strong they both are, especially Toja [Ellison]. She was also really happy to be in the finals so it will be a great match and I hope we will have fun in the final, too.”

Croatia and India will shoot for compound mixed team bronze.

The four finalists in the compound and recurve mixed teams at Antalya 2022

After dominating hosts Turkey, complete with Olympic Champion Mete Gazoz, 6-0 in their opener, Great Britain's recurve mixed team duo of Bryony Pitman and Alex Wise continued their winning way with a 5-3 defeat of Germany and a tiebreak win (18-17) over the USA.

“I feel absolutely amazing,” said Pitman after the USA victory. “We tried to make hard work of it being 4-0 up and then heading to a shoot-off but we’ve managed to stay in the gold [contention] and that’s what we needed to do.”

Britain will face India in the final. The Indian mixed team beat Ukraine, Poland and Spain.

“This is my first final after so many years so I’m very happy,” said India’s Tarundeep Rai, the 38-year-old who made his Olympic debut back at Athens 2004. “With my teammate [Ridhi], she’s very new and only 18 so it will be a great experience for her and we hope to shoot well in the final.”

Spain will take on the USA in the recurve mixed team bronze medal match.

All four mixed team medal matches are scheduled to take place this weekend, compound on Saturday morning and recurve on Sunday morning. Competition in Antalya continued with recurve eliminations – down to final fours – this afternoon.