Indian Archers End 21st Asian Archery Championship On a High

21st Asian Archery Championship: Abhishek Verma and Jyoti Surekha Vennam clinched a gold medal in the compound mixed pair event on the final day of the 21st Asian Archery Championship. This is the only gold medal which the Indian archers could manage in this tournament. However, Indian archers have won seven medals to their name.

Abhishek Verma and Jyoti Surekha Vennam

Abhishek Verma, who hails from Andhra Pradesh teamed up with Delhi’s Jyoti Surekha, to overwhelm Chinese Taipei Yi-Hsuan Chen and Chieh-Luh Chen 158-151 to claim the top honor. India has won 7 medals in the tournament including one gold, two silver and 4 bronze.

Earlier on the final day, Verma had to face disappointment in the Compound Team event as the archer missed the yellow medal by just one point as he lost a closely contested encounter to Korea 232–233 to settle for a silver.

Abhishek Verma, who won the gold medal with Jyoti in the joint team, said, “The conditions were quite bad, because the wind was blowing and it was our last chance to win a gold medal, which was successful.” At the same time, Jyoti Surekha Vanam said, “I am very happy with the score. Even in the last match, we came out well.”

On Tuesday, Atanu Das won the bronze medal in the men’s recurve event. Das won the bronze by defeating Jin Hayek Oh 6-5 in the shootout. Das also won a bronze medal in mixed team recurve event with Deepika Kumari on Monday.

The Indian archers are participating as neutral athletes in the event as the National Federation is suspended by World Archery after it failed to hold its elections.

The men’s team has already secured Olympic berth from the World Championships whereas the women’s team will aim to bag the berths from the continental championship which has six quota places up for grabs for Tokyo Olympics.

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