France orchestrate early-round upsets in recurve events

With the heat rising, the early stages of individual eliminations got underway at the first Archery World Cup stage of the year in Shanghai. 

Without the top eights in each division, the first two rounds threw up the usual morning upsets – most, this time around, courtesy of the French squad. 

D’ALMEIDA – BRA / GIROUILLE – FRA 

Last year’s Archery World Cup Final silver medallist Marcus D’ALMEIDA, the Brazilian wonderkid, ran into an in-form Romain GIROUILLE. 

Despite the Frenchman struggling in qualification, he drilled seven of nine arrows into the 10 to win the first-round match in straight sets. 

“I just didn’t produce my best,” said Marcus. “The bow was working but I need to do more work on my form.” 

“We’re not in the team competition so I’ll be spending then next few days training – looking at what went wrong and what went right, focusing on what went right.” 

Result: GIROUILLE through (out in second round) 

ROMAN – MEX / SCHUH – FRA 

One up on D’ALMEIDA at Lausanne last year, ROMAN took gold there. She went one round further in Shanghai before getting beaten in a one-arrow shoot-off by French woman Berengere SCHUH. 

Aida shot a run of three 26-point sets in the middle of the match. 

It kept things level heading into set five, but a seven handed SCHUH the win… for the second time this year. Berengere also beat Aida in the second round at the Nimes stage of the last Indoor Archery World Cup. 

Result: SCHUH through 

RUGGIERI – FRA / CHANG – KOR 

Just minutes earlier, the French women had taken an even bigger scalp when Laura RUGGIERI thrashed CHANG Hye Jin of Korea, 6-0. 

CHANG, winner in Antalya last year, had not displayed the same form at this event, qualifying a very un-Korean 12th and not receiving a bye into the third round. 

She wouldn’t make it there under her own steam, going out to RUGGIERI after failing to find the 10 with any of her nine arrows. 

“I was on the French cadet team that beat Korea at Wuxi 2013,” said Laura. “So I knew it wasn’t impossible.” 

“We did a huge amount of training the offseason – and now to have the experience of getting through two rounds at an international and in a world championship year is great.” 

Result: RUGGERI through

VAN DER VEN – NED / GODFREY – GBR

A first-round clash between top recurve men’s qualifier for the World Cup Final last year Rick VAN DER VEN and an off-the-boil Larry GODFREY – who seeded 100 – did not look promising.

But Larry summoned a pair of 29s to jump ahead in the match, riding a last-set draw to victory. 

Rick, who is not one to usually duck out in the first round of any event, came quickly to terms with the loss: “Just one of those days where the arrows just didn’t do what I wanted.” 

“I usually feel bad for a couple of hours, then I’m fine.” 

“There’s the team event to concentrate on now.”

Result: GODFREY through (out in third round) 

DEATON – USA / PAGNI – ITA

“I was not excited about my qualification,” admitted Bridger DEATON. He landed in just 35th place after the ranking round.

“Today, things were coming together a lot better. Shooting the way I expected to be shooting with the shots I was making.”

Reigning Archery World Cup Champion Bridger had only dropped one point in 12 arrows heading into the last end with two-time champ Sergio PAGNI. He also held a three-point lead.

One X10, two nines later – and Bridger was into the third and well back on track. 

Result: DEATON through

Read more about Shanghai 2015.