Chen secures Chinese Taipei’s 1st compound title

Chen Hsiang-Hsuan beat the USA’s Steve Anderson in the men’s final on Antalya beach to win his first international gold and Chinese Taipei’s first title in the compound discipline on the Hyundai Archery World Cup circuit.

“This is like a dream. Before this I saw the World Cup finals on TV or YouTube, and I never thought I would stand in this arena and shoot here,” said fourth-seed Chen.

The 21-year-old, who also took silver in the mixed team event with Chen Yi-Hsuan, said the federation had hired a New Zealander coach to advance the level of the compound archers on the national team.

“In the future, some of us will become compound coaches and teach the young archers,” he added.

Anderson, second ranked after qualification in Antalya, said he’d “take the result and build on it”. He was happy with the result in the windy conditions, shooting a hinge release, but had nothing but praise for Chinese Taipei’s progress as a competitive nation in the compound division.

“They’ve put together a solid team here. They’ve got one solid individual and then a couple who are great in supporting roles,” said Steve. “I shot against another one of their archers in Shanghai and shot a great match against him to beat him, he hung tight the whole way.”

“I see a lot of talent on their recurve side, there always has been, but they continue to focus on compound and they’ll be as competitive as anybody.”

After only dropping four points in four elimination matches, Anderson struggled to find the middle on a blustery afternoon on the beach, scoring just 141 points to Chen’s 144.

“I’m trying to build a career not one podium. I’ll move on with it, keep shooting the hinge, and next time I’ll be a little bit more experienced and a little better in this situation,” he said.

The USA’s Braden Gellenthien took bronze in the compound men’s event.

The second stage of the 2017 Hyundai Archery World Cup runs 6 to 11 June in Antalya, Turkey.