Dublin 2016 was barebow woman Eleonora Strobbe’s fourth World Archery Field Championships in a row.
Originally from Trentino, a north-Italian region in which archery is fairly popular, she’s a former volleyball player and ice skater, who discovered archery through her best friend’s uncle.
“It was in 2005 when I first tried archery,” she said. “I had tried volleyball and ice skating before, but they both were sports that involved groups, which I didn’t like much. So that’s when my best friend said to me: ‘Oh I have an uncle that does archery, let’s try it’ – and that’s how it all started.”
First taught barebow, Eleonora said that the style fit her personality.
“I like the barebow. I think every person gets to choose a bow based on their own character. I guess I stayed with the barebow because I’m not as perfectionist as compounders might be, for example. It doesn’t matter if sometimes I miss, I’m okay with it, so I think it suits me well,” Strobbe said.
“Barebow is also more fun! You don’t have the distress of the clicker or the sight, so you just get there and release when you feel it. There’s a lot of concentration involved, you have to feel yourself and the bow at the same time.”
Her first appearance at a field worlds came in Visegrad, Hungary in 2010 – where she won gold.
Two years later, in Val d’Isere, France in 2012, Strobbe added a silver medal and then, in Zagreb, Croatia in 2014, she finished with bronze.
“I’m always in the top four and then I always have some problems in the finals matches. I think the competition is not the problem, it is the match itself because I get a bit anxious and I just want to do it well,” she explained.
“Despite the fact that I’m not looking for perfection while I shoot, I do want to make sure everything goes well. Everybody wants to win, and so do I.”
In Dublin, Eleonora started her campaign for a fourth world field championships podium in a row with gusto.
She was second after the unmarked and marked qualification days with 616 points, and then lead the first elimination round with 163 out of 216 points. She then shot 100 out of 144 points in the second elimination to make the final four.
“During qualification days I had some problems with the bow, then I fixed them and it worked well today. I’m happy about how things have been going so far,” she said after eliminations day.
In the semis, she beat 2014 Champion Lina Bjorklund to make the gold medal match against France’s Chantal Porte.
She lost to Porte by six points, 43-37, in a match far beyond her performance throughout week.
"It is how it is. I know I have to work more when it comes to a gold medal match because my nerves controls my mind and is not how it should be,” she explained.
At 24 years of age, and a foreign languages student, Eleonora has plenty more performances left to give.
“When I’m not working at the tourism office or studying my degree, I’m shooting. It’s hard to combine everything, but I like archery and even though sometimes I have thought about retiring, I just can’t stop doing it,” she said.
Strobbe will be a local at the next world fields in Italy – a venue where she will try, once again, to collect the gold that has been elusive since her big debut in 2010.
