The big news of the weekend was the National Indoor Championships held at Stoneleigh near Coventry. A two-day event, the biggest in the Indoor calendar, with the Adults Championships taking place the Saturday and Junior Championships on the Sunday.
The Adult Championships comprised of a WA18 three-spot qualifying round followed by head-to head knockout rounds to decide the winners. Richard Hainge made his debut at the Championships in the 50+ category, with the top 16 scores going through into the head-to-heads. After a nervous start, Richard settled down to produce a score of 525, consistent with what he had been shooting on home soil. Richard was shooting in the second of three sessions and so had to wait until the last session was over to see if he had made the cut. He had, qualifying in 15th place which meant he was up against the second-place qualifier in the first round of the knockouts. The head-to-heads consist of three arrow ends. A win scores 2 points, a draw 1, with the first person to 6 points progressing to the next round. The first end was a draw; the second end went to Richard. 3-1 up. His opponent came back to level the match 3-3. Richard took the fourth end. 5-3 up and only needed to hit a 9 in the fifth end to progress to round two. It went into the 8. All square and the match to be decided by a one arrow shoot off – the arrow nearest the centre taking the win. His opponent hit a 10, which Richard couldn’t match and his campaign was over. Still a good effort for his first attempt.
Fifteen-year-old Erin Hainge made her debut in the Ladies Recurve Championship, using it as a warmup for the u16’s tournament the following day. Completely unfazed by the challenge Erin put in a score of 539, just 3 points short of her pb. The top 32 scorers progressed into the head-to-heads with Erin qualifying in 24th place. She made a flying start against the eighth seed, taking the first end to go 2 points up. Erin lost the next despite strong shooting, so it was all square. In the next end Erin hit 10,10,9 but her opponent responded with all 10’s and went on to win 6-2. It was still a terrific effort from the young Manxie and she went into Sunday’s Junior Championships brimming with confidence.
The Junior Championships take place using a Portsmouth round with a simple format of highest score wins. Erin shot in the first of two sessions, so another lengthy wait was in store to see the final placings. Erin put in a consistent round to post a score of 565. At the end of the session, she was in first place. With another 13 archers lining up in the second session all Erin could do was wait. The tension must have been unbearable but after the dust settled and the all the scores were verified, the stress had been worth it – Erin had done it! She had taken the title by a clear margin of 21 points – she was the British u16’s Indoor Champion. A brilliant result from a brilliant person. Congratulations go out to her from the whole Club.
Meanwhile on home soil it looked as though Rhys Moore might be outscored in the Compound division, not by his male opponents who were nowhere near him, but by an on-song Aalin George. Aalin outscored Rhys over the first 3 dozen arrows before slipping out of the 10 zone into the 9’s and allowing, a very determined, Rhys to slip past her. He posted a score that was 15 points ahead of his nearest male rival but only 6 points better than Aalin. Chris Crompton took the Barebow win against Colin Moore and Stan Gorry. Johnathan Gordon triumphed over newbie Radu in the Gents Recurve and Barbara Harris decided to shoot in spite of nursing back, neck and shoulder injuries. She did, however, remember to come to the shooting line with some arrows in her quiver and her bow fully assembled.
Results Onchan: Gents Compound- 1.R.Moore 60/581/41, 2.D.Moore 59/566/35, 3.L.Corran 60/564/24, 4.P.Mumford 60/555/18. Ladies Compound- 1.A.George 60/575/35, 2.J.Gough 59/537/13, 3.C.Irving-Potter 58/480/3. Gents Barebow- 1.C.Crompton 60/525/11, 2.C.Moore 60/481/8, 3.S.Gorry 59/428/3. Gents Recurve- 1.J.Gordon 60/581/42, 2.Radu 60/505/18. Ladies Recurve-B.Harris 54/453/8.
Isle of Man Archery Club 