GWANGJU, Korea – The top compound and recurve archers are gathered in the southwest Korean city of Gwangju for the 2025 World Archery Championships, which run from Friday (local time) for seven days.
A team of 12 archers from the United States is led by top 10 archers in each division. Brady Ellison, the recurve men’s world number one, is joined by Trenton Cowles and Christian Stoddard. Both archers are making their debut at this level, though both are regulars on the World Cup circuit and have previously competed at the World Youth Championships.
“This is going to my first senior (world championships),” began Cowles. “But I’ve been to a couple Youth World Championships, in Poland and Spain, so at the end of the day it’s the same thing; you’re shooting your arrow and if you go through your routine, go through your mental process, it should be just like everything else.”
For Stoddard, this marks a second world championships in the space of a few weeks. He won recurve U21 men’s team gold with Joshua Baek and Jack Krengel at last month’s World Archery Youth Championships in Canada.
Recurve women include Casey Kaufhold, the world number two, alongside the familiar faces of Catalina GNoriega and Jennifer Mucino-Fernandez. This trio set new standards in World Cup women’s team competition this year, claiming team gold, silver and bronze. The gold, won in Turkey in early June, was a first recurve women’s team gold for the USA since 2015, and only the second ever.
In James Lutz, the compound men have the world number four. He will compete for glory alongside Curtis Broadnax and Grady Kane. Kane was part of the team in Winnipeg last month at the World Youth Championships and replaces Jesse Clayton who has returned home for personal reasons.
Alexis Ruiz, the women’s world number 10, has 2023 World Youth champion Sydney Sullenberger and Olivia Dean for company. Dean won silver at World Cup Stage 1 this year, when held in Florida. Ruiz returns having been part of the 2023 team in Berlin, from which she claimed compound mixed team gold with Sawyer Sullivan. She was also part of the 2019 World Youth Championships team that included Broadnax, Cowles, GNoriega, Kaufhold and Mucino-Fernandez.
That year, Ellison and Lutz were both winning individual World Championship gold, when the World Championships were held in the Netherlands. The last time Korea staged this event was 2009. Reo Wilde returned with individual gold in compound men and was part of the men’s team to take gold, alongside Dave Cousins and Braden Gellenthien.
You can follow the schedule and keep up with all the scores and results from Gwangju. See below for times of coverage for the live finals.
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COMPOUND MEN |
COMPOUND WOMEN |
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Curtis Broadnax |
Olivia Dean |
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RECURVE MEN |
RECURVE WOMEN |
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Trenton Cowles |
Catalina GNoriega |
No nation has won more medals at the World Archery Championships than the United States, stretching back to when the tournament began in 1931. The first of the 65 gold medals was won by Donald MacKenzie at the third edition of the event in London in 1933.
Not only was MacKenzie the first archer from the United States to win gold at the World Championships but he was also the first archer from outside of Europe to even compete at the event.
MacKenzie did not defend his title when the championships moved to Sweden in 1934. In fact, the USA were not regulars until after the Second World War. It would not be until 1950, when the Danish capital Copenhagen played hosts, that the USA would add to that MacKenzie gold. Jean Lee became the first female archer from the United States to win gold, with teammate Jean Richards claiming silver. Russ Reynolds was a bronze medalist in the men’s competition.
The first non-European nation to host this competition was the United States, when Valley Forge in Pennsylvania welcomed the world in 1969. Other US cities to host since include Los Angeles in 1983, New York in 2003 and Yankton, S.D. in 2021.
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Session |
Date |
Time (MT) |
Streaming |
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Compound team finals |
Saturday, September 6 |
11:00pm |
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Compound men eliminations |
Sunday, September 7 |
7:00pm |
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Compound men finals |
Sunday, September 7 |
11:00pm |
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Compound women eliminations |
Monday, September 8 |
7:00pm |
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Compound women finals |
Monday, September 8 |
11:00pm |
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|
Recurve team finals |
Tuesday, September 9 |
11:00pm |
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|
Recurve men eliminations |
Wednesday, September 10 |
7:00pm |
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Recurve men finals |
Wednesday, September 10 |
11:00pm |
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Recurve women eliminations |
Thursday, September 11 |
7:00pm |
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Recurve women finals |
Thursday, September 11 |
11:00pm |
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