Kim Woojin tops men’s ranking round at second consecutive Olympic test event
Kim Woojin took the number one seed in the recurve men’s competition at the Ready Steady Tokyo test event for next summer’s Olympic Games after scoring 679 points for the 72-arrow 70-metre ranking round.
It is the second consecutive Olympic test event at which the Korean archer finishes top of qualification.
“This is a great chance to test the field before the Olympics. It’s a great help to learn the atmosphere of the stadium and the environmental factors of the field,” said Woojin.
The top men’s scores were lower than that from the women, who shot during the morning. The rain and wind picked up a little in the afternoon.
“I do not think I’ve had a bad qualification because it is a new competition and a different field with its own environment,” said Kim. “I think it’s just important to catch these differences and hit the middle quickly in any conditions.”
Brady Ellison seeded second with 677 points. Lee Seungyun and Sjef van den Berg ranked third and fourth, both shooting 674. Seungyun had 35 10s to Sjef’s 31.
This tournament follows the same competition format as the Olympic Games, where there are 64 athletes in the recurve men’s category and every archer advances to matchplay with no byes.
As there are 67 recurve men participating in this test event, there was a top-64 cut.
Facing top-ranked Kim Woojin in the first round will be para archer Timothy Palumbo. The USA has sent both an Olympic and Paralympic team to this tournament as there will not be a separate test event for para athletes.
Kim finished fifth at the test event prior to the Olympics in 2012 and first the year before Rio.
He subsequently missed out on the team for London and lost in the second round of matchplay at the most recent Games. Winning this test event is no guarantee of success at the Olympics themselves – but that is no reason for the 27-year-old to take this tournament for granted.
“I’m focusing on two things. [Winning and learning.] I’m competing so I need to concentrate on myself and my form,” he explained. “If I don’t do that or I don’t focus on competing then I will feel different to when I’m normally at an event. So I’m gaining experience and competing.”
Kim Woojin and top women’s seed Jeon Ina led the mixed team ranking round, ahead of the Netherlands and Chinese Taipei.
This is the first Olympic test event to include a mixed team competition as Tokyo 2020 will be the first Olympic Games to feature the mixed-gender pairs category.
The Ready Steady Tokyo test event takes place on 11-18 July 2019 in the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic venue in Tokyo, Japan.
