Beginners’ guide to archery at the 2019 Universiade in Napoli

The Summer Universiade is an international multisport games that attracts student sports teams from nations around the globe. It was first held in 1959 and the 2019 edition in Napoli, Italy is the 30th.

Korea was utterly dominant in the archery competition at the last Universiade in Taipei City in 2017​, winning all but one of the 10 gold medals available.

There are seven archers competing at the tournament who are currently ranked top-10 in the world and two of the individual champions – world number one Kang Chae Young and world championship bronze medallist Kim Jongho – return to defend their student-athlete titles in 2019.

Factsheet: Napoli 2019

  • Venue: Stadio Partenio Avellino (qualification) and Palazzo Reale Caserta (finals)
  • Dates: 8-13 July
  • Number of athletes: 204 from 45 countries (63 recurve men, 56 recurve women, 46 compound men, 39 compound women)
  • Number of medals: 10 (recurve and compound, men’s and women’s individual and team, plus mixed team)

Defending champions

These are the winners of the 2017 Summer Universiade in Taipei City, Chinese Taipei.

Individual

Team

  • Recurve men: Korea
  • Recurve women: Korea
  • Recurve mixed: Korea
  • Compound men: Russia
  • Compound women: Korea
  • Compound mixed: Korea

Three facts

1) An alternative team competition format has been introduced in Napoli. Based on the mixed team event, with two athletes competing in the team rather than the normal three, it allows more nations to take part.

As it is not an official international format, the team competition will not contribute towards the world rankings. The individual and mixed team competitions are world ranking events.

2) The age limit for archers to compete at the Universiade was reduced to 25 for this tournament. Previously, athletes up to the age of 28 could take part.

3) Before Kang Chae Young, who is competing in Napoli, took hold of the recurve women’s ranking round world record – a couple of world best scores were set at the Universiades in 2015 and 2017.

Ki Bo Bae shot 686 points in Gwangju in 2015. Choi Misun, who is also shooting in Napoli, scored 687 points in Taipei in 2017.

Chae Young currently holds the world record at 692 points. That score was set one month ago at the 2019 Hyundai World Archery Championships in ’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands.

Schedule

  • Tuesday 9 July: Qualification
  • Wednesday 10 July: Individual eliminations
  • Thursday 11 July: Team and mixed team eliminations
  • Friday 12 July: Compound finals
  • Saturday 13 July: Recurve finals

Favourites

The top three archers competing at the tournaments in the world rankings as of Monday 8 July 2019. Overall world ranking given in brackets.

Recurve men

Recurve women

Compound men

Compound women

Competition format

The competition at the Universiade is run to standard international rules except for the team competition, which will consist of two archers rather than three.

Recurve athletes shoot at 122cm targets set 70 metres away, with 10 scoring zones. Competition starts with a 72-arrow ranking round, used to rank athletes, and is followed by knock-out elimination matches resolved using the set system.

Athletes shoot sets of three arrows – and the highest-scoring athlete in the set receives two set points; a draw awards one set point to each athlete. The first athlete to six set points wins the match.

(Two-athlete teams and mixed teams shoot sets of four arrows, two per athlete. The first team or mixed team to five set points wins the match.)

Compound athletes shoot at 80cm targets set 50 metres away, with six scoring zones awarding 10 to five points (the outer four are removed). Competition starts with a 72-arrow ranking round, used to rank athletes, and is followed by knock-out elimination matches resolved using cumulative scoring.

Athletes shoot 15 arrows, in five ends of three arrows, and the highest-scoring athlete wins the match. (Two-athlete teams and mixed teams shoot 16 arrows, two per athlete per end.)

The archery competitions at the 2019 Summer Universiade take place on 8-13 July in Napoli, Italy.

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