Latin America will shoot for two individual gold medals

Recurve Men

The first round saw the arrival of the top eight seeded athletes from qualifications, and the elimination of three of them. Mexico’s Luis ALVAREZ, seeded No 38 but strong at the Mexican Grand Prix and Arizona Cup this year, edged out No 6 seed Gaël PREVOST (FRA). Korea’s JIN Jae WANG, No 7, lost to Russia’s Bair TSYBEKDORZHIEV (No 39). Markiyan IVASHKO (No 8) lost to Shohei OTA (JPN). No 4 seed from China XING Yu trailed Thomas AUBERT (FRA/ 36) 2-4, but came back to 6-4. In a battle of Olympic gold medallists, Italy’s Michele FRANGILLI led IM Dong Hyun 2-0, but the Korean won the next three sets and the match.
The fall of favourites continued in the 1/8 round, when Mauro NESPOLI (ITA) defeated XING, and ZHANG Jianping (CHN/19) upset No 3 IM Dong-Hyun (KOR). ALVAREZ edged out 2008 Olympic champion Viktor RUBAN (UKR/22).
OH was the only athlete to win a quarter-final in straight sets. After a tie at 3-3 with Juan René SERRANO (MEX), top qualifier LEE Seungyun lost the match 3-7. NESPOLI defeated former world No 1 ELLISON in a shoot-off (10-8). Finally, ZHANG was too strong for ALVAREZ (7-3). In the first semi-final, SERRANO (photo) quickly edged out NESPOLI in three sets. In the gold medal match, he will face the Olympic champion OH, who defeated ZHANG.
“I haven’t qualified for a final in a long time”, SERRANO said. “I am indeed very happy to be back in the game and to fight for the gold medal again. I know the site of final and I know that it will be windy, so I will try to use it to my advantage. I hope that it will be harder for my opponent.”
Recurve Women
Of all the favourites in this category, only two didn’t pass the 1/16 elimination round. No 5 Anastasia PAVLOVA (UKR) lost to Danish Olympian Carina CHRISTIANSEN, while FANG Yuting (CHN/6) was stopped by Kristina TIMOFEEVA (RUS/27). 
In the next round, Olympic medallist Natalia VALEEVA (ITA) shot two arrows in the wrong target in her match against CUI Yuanyuan (CHN), resulting in two misses and an easy victory for the Chinese archer. CUI faced Olympic silver medallist Aida ROMAN (MEX) in quarter-finals, and after a tie at 4-4, capitalised on two 8s from her opponent to win the match. The three other quarter-finals went to the three Koreans, KI Bo Bae (No 1), YUN Ok Hee (No 2) and JOO Hyun Jung (No 3), resulting in semi-finals between the top four qualifiers. 
The semi-final between CUI and KI came down to the last arrow. After CUI scored a 9, the Olympic champion from Korea needed a 10 to win, but she delivered an 8 instead. In the other semi-final, YUN easily defeated JOO 6-0. She will face CUI in the final.
Compound Men
In the first round, MIN Lihong (KOR/4) stopped multiple-time world team champion Dave COUSINS (USA). World Cup finalist Pierre-Julien DELOCHE lost to teammate Christophe DOUSSOT (No 14), while the second French World Cup finalist Dominique GENET lost to world No 1 Reo WILDE (USA) in a tight match.
Top qualifier Rodger WILLETT Jr. didn’t go past the 1/8 round: he lost to Patrick LAURSEN (photo), who was originally an alternate on the Danish team, and was selected only last week. A second Danish archer Martin DAMSBO (No 5) advanced to quarter-finals.
All athletes scored very high in the quarter-finals. In a rematch of last year’s World Cup Final, WILDE met GELLENTHIEN, and once again the latter won by the smallest margin. Meanwhile, the two Danish archers were impressive. DAMSBO defeated MIN Lihong 147-146, while LAURSEN outscored Amir KAZEMPOOR (IRI/8) by four points. The last quarter-final featured two surprising men, No 14 DOUSSOT and No 22 Georg DOLLINGER (AUT), who knocked out No 3 Rajat CHAUHAN (IND) and world record holder Peter ELZINGA (NED), respectively. The match turned in favour of the Austrian.
In the first semi-final, LAURSEN shot 10 after 10, for a victory 150-145 against DAMSBO. In the final, he will face George DOLLINGER, who dropped just one point in the other semi-final to defeat Braden GELLENTHIEN. 
Compound Women
Favourites Albina LOGINOVA (RUS), world No 1, and Jamie VAN NATTA (USA), current World Cup Final champion, were eliminated in the first round of the day. The Russian lost to Korea’s CHOI Bomin, and VAN NATTA to former World Cup stage winner Sandrine VANDIONANT (FRA).
The next favourite out was Erika JONES, who lost the 1/8 round to Inge VAN CASPEL (NED) over the last three arrows. In the same round, SEOK Ji Hyun (KOR/5) defeated Marcella TONIOLI (ITA/12) in a close match. After ties at 55-55, 85-85, 114-114, the Korean standout took the advantage in the last end, 144-141. Her teammate CHOI Bomin was stopped at this stage by Pascale LEBECQUE. Last year’s runner-up Kristina BERGER (GER) shot 148 points to defeat SEO Jung Hee (KOR/6) and advance to the quarter-finals, where she defeated Linda OCHOA (145-139). Two Koreans also won their quarter-finals: No 1 YOUN over DODEMONT, and SEOK over LEBECQUE by just one point. Finally, surprising Sara LOPEZ (COL/23) faced Inge VAN CASPEL in the last quarter-final, and won 141-138!
In the first semi-final, SEOK confirmed her status as archery’s new star. The Shanghai champion defeated teammate YOUN and will have another shot at gold. She will be challenged by Colombia’s LOPEZ, who shot superbly to outscore BERGER in the other semi-final.
The 18-year-old LOPEZ was in tears of joy and said: “We wanted to show the work that we have accomplished toward the Medellin World Cup. There are many talented girls in Colombia and we now hope to continue in this path, on home soil in Medellin, along with Alejandra USQUIANO and the rest of the team. I have never felt such an intense emotion, and this is my first World Cup event. It is a dream come true and I have learnt a lot here. I’m really happy.”
World Archery Communication