China, Australia share archery pride
JAKARTA (JP): China and Australia maintained their formidable grip on victory to share the laurels in the national archery championships, after weathering challenges from Indonesian rivals.
Indonesia's number two, Gatot Ariyanto, continued his commendable showing when the New Olympic Round men's individual competition resumed yesterday. Gatot, who upset top seed Jackson Fear of Australia on Friday, produced another giant-killing win by ousting Australian Matt Gray in the semifinals.
Gatot, however, ran out of steam against the blistering performance of China's Fu Shengiun. The Chinese, who upset compatriot Sun Wei in the other semifinal, outclassed plucky Gatot 108-101 in the final round.
Gray made amends for his failure in the semifinals with a convincing 112-105 win over second seed Sun in the third-place playoff.
Despite the loss, Gatot, who represents East Java in the tournament, took the gold medal. Foreign athletes from China, Australia and Singapore joined the tournament as non-competitors. The national championships serve as a warm-up event for the 38th World Championships here in August.
National number one Hendra Setijawan of East Java earned the silver, despite his sixth-place finish. East Java completed a clean sweep as Haryono scored the national best third.
Fear led an Australian trio to upset China in the team event. Australia combined a score of 270 to surpass China by just two points.
Gatot teamed up with Hendra and Haryono to finish third with a 242-207 thrashing of Lampung.
Organizers of the world championships, the first ever to be held in Indonesia, announced yesterday that 315 men's and women's archers from 52 countries have confirmed their entry in the coming world archery event.
The Aug. 1- Aug. 6 world meet will introduce the compound event, a new discipline which uses special tools to speed up the projectiles.
President Soeharto is expected to officially open the event, which is to be followed by a congress held by the world archery governing body FITA. (amd)