One of the biggest clubs in the world

With more than 450 members and star archers such as Morgan Lundin, Magnus Petersson, Göran Bjerendal or PetraEricsson, the Archery Club of Lindome is one of the most famous in the world. We had the real pleasure to sit down with its President, Lennart Mattsson.

Photo © Dean Alberga

The Lindome Club:

1954: The Lindome Club (Lindome Bagskytteklubb) is founded with 10 members

1964: It organizes its 1st Swedish Championships

1969: It takes part in his 1st  tournament outside Sweden

1970: The first Club House is built and the membership jumps to around 80 archers

1976: Lindome organizes its 1st Field World Championships

1984: The club has 3 Olympians in Los Angeles (Göran Bjerendal, Gert Bjerendal, Liselotte Andersson) and 2 Paralympians (Jan Thulin and Nikolaj Babkin)

1986: It organizes the Archery World Championships for Disabled

1990: It extends its Club House with an inside shooting range

2004: It celebrates its 50th anniversary with 350 members

2006: It organizes its 2nd Field World Championships and has 450 members.

President Mattsson, the club has a rich history. When did you join the journey ?

Well… it has been a good and long time. I joined the club in 1965, after a friend convinced me to watch the Swedish Championships the year before. I was the Secretary from 1968 to 75, I had my first stint as President from 83 to 89, a position I have also enjoyed since 1997. Maybe, I’ll stay one more year.

This is impressive, what keeps you going ?

The friends and the people around the club. It’s like a big family. We also had a permanent collaborator in the club since 1985 in order to take care of the technical aspects, but he retired 2 years ago. Now, it is a bit more difficult because we must take care of our 450 members. It takes 2-3 hours everyday.

What motivated you to bid for a 2nd World Championships ?

In 1999, we saw a report in the Swedish National Magazine with a note from the Secretary General Leif Janson : “Why don’t we show up more the Swedish talent in Archery ?”. I remembered being in the Organizing Committee for the 1976 Worlds, and some of us thought we could do it again.

How did you work since 1999 ?

With 6 other clubs in the Göteborg area, we created “Vision West”. In 2001, our bid was successfully received by the FITA Congress. Since 2000, we organized 4x the Swedish Indoor Championships to get experience and to get some money support. In 2005, we organized the Swedish Field Archery Championships as the “test event” for the Worlds. So I think that the Organizing Committee, under the direction of Bo Palm, really took it step by step.

What were the easy and difficult areas of work ?

I would say the technical part, which means the courses with the targets, was easier for us, because we have a lot of Field Archery experience in the region. The most difficult was to arrange the logistic to welcome all the archers or officials coming to Göteborg. We must of course thank all the volunteers, including more than 50 that are members of the Lindome Club.

What are the differences with 1976 ?

In 76, we had 90 shooters, now we have 230. This year we also must change the tracks overnight from 24 to 12 targets, marked or unmarked, and deal with a special field for the Finals on Saturday at the Trädgårdsföreningen garden. In 1976, I also remember the charisma of the FITA President, Mrs. Inger Frith.

Photo: Lennart Mattsson

What can you say about the tracks for this year ?

They are very nice, very compact. We learned from the test event and we have shortened the distance between each target. It will be a maximum of 80 meters walking. We also took advantage of the beautiful scenery with the lake around theGunnebo Castle.

Where do you stand from a budget point of view ?

As I said, we prepared these Worlds for many years and we must thank the support from the city of Mölndal and the Gunnebo Castle (where the qualifications take place during this week) as well as the support of Göteborg, who also organized successfully the European Athletics World Championships just two weeks ago. However, it is always difficult to keep the figures in the budget. For instance, we organized an extra practice on Sunday that was not foreseen. We are nevertheless very happy to welcome so many teams worldwide. It is good publicity for Archery and Sweden.

Have you seen the media interest ?

Yes ! A TV channel came to the Opening Ceremony and we have coverage in the newspaper. We will publish a news sheet every day and, actually, we’ll give one to every delegation.

Talking about Sweden, do you still have the same quality of archers ?

I think we have always been strong in Archery and especially Field Archery. Even if some of our top archers get older, we currently have a good new generation. The young ones may show all their talent this week. We have about 8’000 archers in Sweden, including 1’000 in the West coast. This is not so much but we have quality. One of the reasons is that any kid can actually shoot with and ask advices to our top archers such as Goran, Morgan or Petra. In Sweden the top athletes stay very friendly.

What do you hope for the week ?

We hope for the sun, the public and happy archers !

Thank you very much and good luck !

Didier Miéville

FITA Communication