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by Mary Beth Vorwerk – USA Archery
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 17, 2004
ATHENS, Greece – Jennifer Nichols and Vic Wunderle, the only two remaining U.S. competitors in the individual event, won their round of 16 matches today and will advance to the 1/8 elimination.
Nineteenth ranked Nichols (Cheyenne, Wyo.) faced 14th ranked Tetyana Berezhna (UKR) in a very close and exciting match. After six arrows, Nichols was behind by one point with a score of 52-51 and the match was tied at 108 after 12 arrows. Nichols was again down by one point going into the last three arrows, and came back to win the match after shooting two tens and an eight to Berezhna’s eight, nine and ten, taking the match with a score of 163-160.
“Going into the last three arrows, I was really nervous but it was so exciting for me,” said Nichols. “I was taking a deep breath before every arrow and just trying to focus on what I needed to do.”
In the round of eight on Wednesday, Nichols will face third ranked Yun Mi Jin of Korea, who won her match against 35th ranked Sayami Matsushita (JPN) today after shooting a 173 out of a possible 180 points to Matshshita’s 149. The match will start at 8:30 a.m.
Forty-third ranked Wunderle (Mason City, Ill.), the 2000 individual silver and team bronze medalist, faced 11th ranked Ming Huang Liu (TPE) in his round of 16 match. After shooting an eight, nine and seven on the first three arrows for a score of 24 to Liu’s 27, Wunderle came back strong after six arrows and led the rest of the match to beat Liu 164-160.
“I got off to a pretty rough start, but luckily I got the wind figured out early enough,” said Wunderle. “I just took it one arrow at a time and was able to get it done.”
Wunderle will face 27th ranked Haifeng Xue (CHN) in the men’s 1/8 elimination round on Thursday.
In the “round of 16” elimination, 32 competitors start the day with each archer shooting one match of 18 arrows at 70 meters. There are four targets on the field, with two archers shooting head-to-head on the left side and two shooting against each other on the right, alternating on each arrow. At the end of the day, 16 archers remain for the round of eight.
Archery competition is taking place at Panathinaiko Stadium in Athens, where the first modern Olympic Games were held in 1896, and it is built on top of the ancient Stadium dating from 329 B.C. The competition runs until August 21, with the women’s 1/8 elimination being held Wednesday morning and the semifinals and finals will take place Wednesday afternoon. The same schedule will apply for the men on Thursday. Team Round competition will be on Friday for the women and on Saturday for the men.
For complete results, please visit www.usarchery.org or www.athens2004.com.
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