Elisabetta Mijno and Daniele Piran spearheaded an impressive performance from Italy at this week’s European Para Championships as the home team won five golds and 14 total medals to lead the overall table.
Mijno and Piran were each seeded top entering matchplay and delivered winning performances in the finals at the Stadio dei Marmi.
The former beat Greece’s Dorothea Poimenidou to the recurve women’s title, 6-2, while the latter dispatched Adrian Orjales Vidal of Spain, 6-2, to win the visually impaired 2/3 event.
“I’m happy of course, I shot well. It’s my second title, I’m very happy,” said Mijno. “There’s a lot of Italian people here to celebrate with me.”
Piran added that making the podium, in Rome, at his first Europeans was something he hadn’t expected.
Reigning Paralympic Champions Phoebe Paterson Pine and David Drahoninsky were among the other individual winners at these continental championships, alongside Eugen Patru, Jere Forsberg, Nil Miser and Ruben Vanhollebeke.
Belgium’s Vanhollebeke extended his unbeaten run in international visually impaired competition in Rome.
The world number one in the VI 1 category, which is for athletes with very little vision, beat Cyprus’ Christos Misos in the final of a second event this year (after last month’s European Cup in Croatia), 6-2.
Vanhollebeke has now won the last two world championships and these Europeans.
“It was very tense and a fun match,” said the 45-year-old. “I’ve won, this year, everything I can win. I’m really enjoying doing archery and promoting archery for everybody.”
Eugen Patru became a first-time Paralympian at Tokyo 2020 having won the final qualifier for those Games. The Romanian archer had never put a podium performance together at a championship-level event until this week’s tournament in Rome.
In the first official results list to feature the country’s new official name, Türkiye landed second – just a single bronze medal behind Italy.
Competition at the 2022 European Para Championships ran on 1-6 August in Rome, Italy.
Winners: 2022 European Para Championships
- Recurve men: Eugen Patru, Romania
- Recurve women: Elisabetta Mijno, Italy
- Compound men: Jere Forsberg, Finland
- Compound women: Phoebe Paterson Pine, Great Britain
- W1 men: David Drahoninsky, Czech Republic
- W1 women: Nil Miser, Türkiye
- Visually impaired 1: Ruben Vanhollebeke, Belgium
- Visually impaired 2/3: Daniele Piran, Italy
Medal table: 2022 European Para Championships
1. 
Italy: 14 (5 gold, 4 silver, 5 bronze)
2. 
Türkiye: 13 (5 gold, 4 silver, 4 bronze)
3. 
Great Britain: 8 (2 gold, 3 silver, 3 bronze)
4. 
Czech Republic: 4 (1 gold, 1 silver, 2 bronze)
Archers representing 12 countries collected the 48 medals (17 gold, 16 silver, 15 bronze) available in Rome.
