Kim Jongho pips home favourite Schloesser to world championship pole position

Kim Jongho shot a perfect last six arrows to close qualification at the 2019 Hyundai World Archery Championships, finishing with 714 out of a possible 720 points and beating world number one Mike Schloesser to the top compound men’s seed in ’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands.

“I’m just really happy with how qualification went. There was hardly any wind so I was able to shoot a good score,” said Jongho. “I was able to get a good result in the ranking round so I hope to have a good result in the individual eliminations as well.”

The Korean world number 12 has won mixed team gold medals but finished ninth individually at the last two world championships.

He and top Korean compound woman So Chaewon combined to score 1421 points and a new mixed team ranking round world record in ’s-Hertogenbosch.

Kim’s 714 was also a personal competition best.

Second-seeded Dutchman Mike Schloesser, who was tied with Jongho going into the last end of the 72-arrow 50-metre ranking round, finished with 712.

He said he was disappointed: “I kinda feel bummed out because I came here to shoot better than this but I’m happy with a 712. My shooting felt really good, my bow felt really good – it just wasn’t my day.”

“I was just missing out on so many arrows that were just out. That’s archery. Sometimes you have the luck, sometimes you have the bad luck – and this is it.”

While just those two archers topped 710, an incredible 42 compound men shot 700 points or more. 

Third-ranked Braden Gellenthien of the USA said the compressed scores at the top of the leaderboard were partly down to “mystery arrows” with tricky, changeable wind causing arrows to land just outside the 10-ring.

Jean Pizarro, Yang Jaewon, Martin Damsbo, Mario Vavro and Choi Yonghee completed the compound men’s top eight.

The score to make the top-104 cut and advance to the matchplay stage of these championships was 682 points. A five-way tie for the last two places in the brackets was won by Linus Stromberg of Sweden and the Beijing 2001 World Archery Champion, Slovenia’s Dejan Sitar.

Korea, the USA and Turkey took the top three seeds in the compound men’s team competition. France, Colombia, Denmark, the Netherlands and Mexico also received byes into the second round as top-eight qualifiers.

Early elimination rounds in the individual compound competitions take place on Wednesday morning in ’s-Hertogenbosch – before the finalists are decided on Thursday afternoon.

The 2019 Hyundai World Archery Championships take place on 10-16 June in ’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands.