Kumari completes 13th triple in Hyundai Archery World Cup history
Deepika Kumari recorded the 13th triple gold – and became the 11th archer to achieve the feat – in the 15-year history of the Hyundai Archery World Cup at the third stage of the year held last weekend in Paris, France.
The Indian world number one picked up her second stage win of the season after the opener in Guatemala, collected her first recurve mixed team gold medal with husband Atanu Das, and led Komalika Bari and Ankita Bhakat to the recurve women’s team title.
“I’m happy because I’m improving,” she said. “This is my first time winning three gold medals.”
The performance is encouraging ahead of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, where Kumari will arrive as the world number one.
“Our country, in archery, it doesn’t have any Olympic medals,” she continued. “It’s very important to win Olympic medals – so it’s very important to me.”
Triples have been available at stages of the Hyundai Archery World Cup since 2010 when the mixed team competition was added to the event. (Pairs competition was held in 2009 but as an exhibition, prior to officially being included in the rules, so are not counted.)
Eleven years on, the upcoming Olympics in Tokyo will be the first at which a single archer can win three gold medals – rather than a maximum of two – with the pairs competition finally making its debut at the Games.
Ki Bo Bae completed the first World Cup triple in 2010.
Choi Misun and Kang Chae Young have both done it twice, the former at back-to-back stages in 2016.
Seven triples have been won by archers from Korea, three from the UA.
The majority, seven, have been completed by recurve women.
Triples on the Hyundai Archery World Cup
- 2010 – stage 4, Shanghai – Ki Bo Bae, Korea
- 2011 – stage 3, Odgen – Brady Ellison, USA
- 2012 – stage 2, Antalya – Reo Wilde, USA
- 2013 – stage 1, Shanghai – Braden Gellenthien, USA
- 2015 – stage 1, Shanghai – Kang Chae Young, Korea
- 2016 – stage 2, Medellin – Sara Lopez, Colombia
- 2016 – stage 2, Medellin – Choi Misun, Korea
- 2016 – stage 3, Antalya – Choi Misun, Korea
- 2017 – stage 2, Antalya – Sarah Sonnichsen, Denmark
- 2018 – stage 1, Shanghai – Chang Hye Jin, Korea
- 2018 – stage 1, Shanghai – Kim Woojin, Korea
- 2019 – stage 1, Medellin – Kang Chae Young, Korea
- 2021 – stage 3, Paris – Deepika Kumari, India
