The USA contingent picked up a leading five medals at the second stage of the 2015/16 Indoor Archery World Cup in Bangkok. Two of them, courtesy of Brady Ellison and Reo Wilde, were gold.
Ellison had qualified top in the recurve men’s competition with 597, tying the 14-year-old world record.
He converted pole position in qualifying into a semifinals berth with victories over Thai archers Tartan Marr and Natthapoom Phusawat, and Mexico’s Orlando Uribe. That semi was against Luis Alvarez, who beat Brady to Pan American gold in Toronto in the summer of 2015.
The pair were evenly matched in all but the second set – where Brady shot a 30, Alvarez a 29. (The other sets were three of 29, one of 30.)
A 6-4 win on set points, and Brady moved on to face Oh Jin Hyek, the reigning Olympic Champion, in the final – who, after making his indoor debut in late 2014, was still searching for his first indoor archery gold medal. He wouldn’t win it in Bangkok, either.
Three straight sets of 30 put Brady 5-1 up, he needed just a 10-9-10 to draw the Korean in the last set, take the match 6-4, and take the maximum Indoor World Cup ranking points available from the tournament.
“It’s a good start to the season and I’m in good form,” said Brady. “I shot well the whole tournament and I’m happy to have won a final again. I hope to keep it up through the indoor season and, of course, continue shooting well during 2016.”
Second-seeded man in the compound competition, Reo Wilde scored 149 out of 150 in four of his five 15-arrow matches (the other was 148) in Bangkok. The incredible and consistently-high-level shooting at 18 metres saw him pass by archers like Kim Taeyoon and Mike Schloesser in the eliminations to make an all-American final against Matt Sullivan.
Sullivan had qualified 12 and upset fifth seed Choi Yong Hee and 2014 Archery World Cup Champion Bridger Deaton.
Reo shot one of his four 149/150 passes of the day. Sullivan was four points shy: Two down at halfway, and finishing up with a 145 total.
“This was a great test to see how my new equipment performed under pressure. It’s a great feeling to have finished on top,” said Reo.
Logan Wilde and Crystal Gauvin added bronze medals to the USA’s haul. Wilde beat Mike Schloesser in the compound men’s 3-4 playoff, in a shoot-off. It was Schloesser’s second losing tiebreaker to the Wilde brothers in a row, after his semifinal with Reo. Mike shot 10s in both, but both the Wildes’ arrows were closer to the middle.
Gauvin had a five-point win over teammate Lexi Keller in the compound women’s bronze medal match, 146-141.
The women’s final saw Korea’s So Chae Won take on world field champ Toja Cerne. The Slovenian archer drew ahead in the fourth end by a point, when her opponent failed to find the middle – shooting three nines – and drilled a 10 with her last arrow to confirm the victory, 142-140.
“Never give up and keep fighting until the end, that’s worked very well for me this tournament,” explained Toja. “The feeling of winning the first competition with my new bow is absolutely amazing!”
Aida Roman won the recurve women’s competition. The lone non-Korean archer to qualify for the last eight, the Olympic silver medallist beat Sim Yeji to gold. Kang Hansol had bronze.
