Olympic Champion Chang Hye Jin to shoot for world title

Coming from behind, Olympic Champion Chang Hye Jin beat Chinese Taipei’s Tan Ya-Ting in five sets, 6-4, to book a place in the 2017 World Archery Championships recurve women’s gold medal match – and a shot at her first individual world title.

“After starting to lose 4-0, honestly, I could have just given up but I didn’t give up right until the end,” said Chang. “I’m just grateful right now.”

Chang shot 683 out of a possible 720 points to seed second over the recurve women’s ranking round. She beat Taru Kuoppa, 6-0, Promila Dimary, 6-4, and Chinese Taipei’s Lin Yu-Hsuan, 7-1, before meeting Tan in the semis.

After losing the first two sets, Chang tied the match at 4 points each and then finished with 29, to Tan’s 24, to take the match, 6-4.

“If I could say something to 20-year-old Chang it would be: ‘Hyejin, you’ve really come a long way’,” the Rio 2016 winner added.

In the gold final, Chang will meet world number three Ksenia Perova who, after seeding 52nd in qualification, upset Deepika Kumari in the second round and beat Anastasia Pavlova, Choi Misun and Dan Zhang to make the semis against USA woman Mackenzie Brown.

“After this semifinal match, I’m happy. I now need to keep the strength for the finals and shoot the same as I did today,” said Perova.

Mackenzie Brown and Tan Ya-Ting will contest the bronze medal.

Mackenzie who shot two personal bests in Mexico, for both 36 and 72 arrows, during the qualification round, said: “I feel really good, it was a really close match for the semifinal but I’ve got some things to work on to make the bronze final what I want.”

“This has been a fantastic closing of the season, so I’m really happy with how everything is going so far,” added Brown, who had new coach Songi Woo – previously in Mexico and Great Britain – behind her.

Wei Chun-Heng and Im Dong Hyun will shoot for the recurve men’s gold medal at the 2017 Hyundai World Archery Championships, after Steve Wijler and Arsalan Baldanov contest bronze.

It will be Wei, Steve and Arsalan’s first senior world championships finals.

“I’m really happy to be here. I didn’t expect to come so far in this competition. I didn’t qualify at my best so I’m really happy. I just want to win bronze but if it doesn’t happen, I will still have a good world champs,” said Wijler.

The 2017 World Archery Championships run 15-22 October in Mexico City, Mexico.