UK Student Archery Association

Kon'nichiwa Tokyo [23/Jul/21]

The Tokyo Olympics has started. The UK's Olympic squad of 6 features no less 3 former BUCS individual champions. The archery schedule is explained on the World Archery website, with the tournament running run from Friday 23rd through to Saturday 31st July.

Remember Tokyo is 8 hours ahead, so catching the action live will require early mornings (or late nights). In fact, the qualifying round has already finished, with ladies Sarah Bettles 15th/653, Bryony Pitman 38th/634, Naomi Folkard 47th/629 and gents Patrick Huston 25th/658, James Woodgate 38th/652, Tom Hall 48th/649.

These seedings mean that for the team events, the mixed team qualified 12th, with Bettles and Huston to play China (seeded 5th) in the round of 16. Only the top 16 mixed pairs made the cut. The UK women's team qualified 9th and will play Italy (seeded 8th). The men's team qualified 10th and will play Indonesia (seeded 7th).

Having won gold at a qualifying event in the Czech Republic, Phoebe Paterson Pine (Worcester) has also been added to the Tokyo Paralympics squad. She will compete in ladies compound. The Paralympics runs in late August and early September.

The Olympics and Paralympics presents a rare opportunity, as archery can appear on a major terrestrial channel and be broadcast to a mainstream, i.e. large, audience. This is particularly true if a British archer goes deep in the draw. Such exposure can only benefit the student clubs in September, when, keeping everything Covid-crossed, there may some element of normality about freshers week.

On that note, following conversations between the two, ArcheryGB asked NFP Archery, a company run by Helen Woodcock (Manchester Met), to create a version of the ArcheryGB Session Coach (Level 1) that meets the needs of University clubs. As it stands, the Session Coach course took several weeks to deliver and would have left student coaches unable to qualify in time for the 2021/22 novice intake.

NFP's course will see the face to face modules taught in September, at NFP Archery in Huddersfield. Candidate coaches can then use their new skills when putting on beginners' courses in their university clubs as part of their supported practice, with the assessment date near the end of term. The cost of the couse is £275. More more info, you can contact info@nfparchery.com