GELLENTHIEN and GAUVIN win USA first mixed team stage gold on the year

9 August 2014

Wroclaw (POL)

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USA pairs made the compound mixed team finals in Shanghai and Medellin but finished with silver and bronze.

“We’ve been close so far,” said Braden GELLENTHIEN, who was paired with Crystal GAUVIN in the States team. It was the USA’s fourth different line-up of the season. “There have been hiccups here and there but we’ve finally got it together in Wroclaw.”

The USA beat India by four points, 155-151, to take gold.

GELLENTHIEN shot earlier today in the compound men’s team bronze final, but was using a wrist strap release rather than his usual back tension. During team eliminations on Friday, he pulled or tore a muscle in his forearm.

“Being the intelligent archer I am, I decided to shoot another one,” the former World Cup Champion admitted, sarcastically. “It was a big mistake.”

Working through the pain and strapping his injured arm, as well as adjusting to different equipment, he called his performance in the team bronze match this morning a “dead weight” his teammates tried to carry.

In the mixed team final, he was quite the opposite: GELLENTHIEN didn’t miss the middle.

Although when asked if he’d be switching to the wrist-style trigger at World Cup competitions for good, the States archer was quite clear: “never again.”

Natalia AVDEEVA was part of the losing Russian trio in the compound women’s team bronze medal match this morning, before shooting in the mixed team bronze this afternoon. In the break, she kept telling herself: “we must win, we MUST.”

Against Mexico, AVDEEVA and Alexander DAMBAEV needed a good last two arrows to take compound mixed team bronze.

“I was nervous,” admitted AVDEEVA. “I was aiming in the eight, but I told myself: no! No eight, I need a 10.”

Her arrow hit the nine, and DAMBAEV took to the line needing 10 points to win the match, nine to draw and force a tiebreaker. He shot 10.

“It was a big relief. Shoot-offs are so damn hard,” said AVDEEVA!

Follow results from the last 2014 Archery World Cup stage in Wroclaw.

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