Once again the Junior and Senior Nationals were held on the same weekend, this year at Coventry’s Ricoh Arena.
Junior National Indoor – Saturday 1st December 2012
Northants were well represented at the Junior Nationals with 10 juniors attending all of which shot well and did the county proud. The Junior Nationals is a Portsmouth round.
A few of the Archer’s put in exceptional performances and managed to bring back some medals and trophies.
Jon Bull of Targetcraft Archers, continued his great form and won the Junior Gents Compound U18 category with a score of 580. This was also the highest compound score of the day making him Junior Gents Compound national champion!
Brad Denny from Archers of Raunds, won the Junior Gents Recurve U16 category with a very impressive 589. This was also the highest Recurve score of the day beating the winning score in the U18 category, making him overall Junior Gents Recurve national champion!
Katie Bayliss also from Archers of Raunds, came 2nd in the Junior Ladies Recurve U16 category with a score of 537.
Katie and Brad were also a part of the EMAS Recurve team that finished 3rd.
Brad was also representing England in the Home Nations event. He achieved the highest score in the team and England won the Home Nations.
Finlay Lancashire of Corby Archers came 3rd in the U12 gents recurve.
The other junior archers from the county who also deserve a mention are Lauren Phillips of AOR, Daniel Nixon of Targetcraft Archers, Josh Hall of WOAC, Katherine Langton of Wicken AC, Max Weston and Emily Rose Stubbs of Banbury Cross Archers, Teagan Allen and Curtis Allen of 1st Long Buckby Scout, and Zak Crawford of Corby Archers. Many of who took part in their first national indoor championships.
Congratulations to everybody and I hope the success continues into 2013.
Senior National Indoor – Sunday 2nd December 2012
The county were also well represented at the Senior Nationals with 13 archers attending. The Senior Nationals is a slightly different format from the Junior Nationals, with a FITA 18m used as a ranking round followed by Head to Head matches to determine the national champion .Many of those archers were attending the Nationals for the very first time .Out of the 13 in attendance 6 of our archers made it through to the Head to Head section of the shoot (top 32 in each category go into the Head to Heads).
Once again we had an archer from the county representing England in the Home Nations event. Lizzie Cantopher from Wellingborough Open Archery Club was a member of the England team that won the Home Nations. Lizzie scored 545 which meant she finished 7th in the Ranking Round. Lizzie won her 1st match in the Head to Head 6-2 but lost her 2nd match 7-1 and finished Tied 9th.
Ian Hannaford from Wellingborough Open Archery Club was shooting at his first National Indoor and scored an impressive 559 in the ranking round and seeded 13th. Unfortunately Ian lost in his 1st round match 7-3 and finished Tied 17th.
Jon Bull of Targetcraft Archers shot at the Senior event as well as the Junior Nationals. Jon once again showed good form to shoot 578 and qualify 10th. Jon won his 1st match 6-0 in convincing style but unfortunately lost a very close match against Alistair Whittingham 7-3 losing in the 5th and final set. Jon finished Tied 9th.
James Mason from Wellingborough Open Archery Club, qualified in 15th after scoring 575 in his ranking round. James won his 1st match 6-2 and narrowly lost his 2nd match. James came from 5-3 down to take the 5th set and tie the match. This resulted in a 1 arrow and although he scored a 10 his opponent was closest to the “X”. James also finised Tied 9th.
James and Jon were also members of the EMAS mixed compound team that won the Regional Merlin Bows trophy along with James and Rikki Bingham. EMAS beat WMAS by the narrowest of margins both teams scored 2309 but EMAS had 151 tens and WMAS only had 150 tens. EMAS won, by 1 ten!
Chas Wilson of Corby archers finished 9th in the ranking round for Gents Longbow with a score of 306. Chas won his 1st match 6-0 but narrowly lost his next match 6-4 to eventual winner Steve Gamble. Chas finished Tied 5th.
Brad Denny from Archers of Raunds, shot in his first Senior Nationals and was in terrific form after his success at the Junior event. Brad scored 567 in his ranking round ( just 1 point short of the current Gents county record) this was good enough to rank him 6th. Brad won his 1st match 6-4. In his 2nd match he faced Conor Hall (Ian’s Conqueror) and he won the match 7-1. His 3rd match was the Quarter Finals and Brad shot against Tom Barber, someone who has represented Great Britain on several occasions. Brad once again showed top form and won a very close match 6-4. This put Brad into the Semi-Finals against Patrick Huston a member of the Northern Ireland Team. Both Archers shot very well but unfortunately for Brad, Patrick won most sets by the odd point to win 7-1. Brad still had one match left to shoot, the Bronze medal match. This match was against Gavin Sutherland, a member of the England team that had won the Home Nations. Brad tried his hardest and shot very well despite being fatigued but Gavin won 6-0 hardly dropping a point in the 3 sets. Brad finished 4th which is a fantastic performance especially as it was his 1st ever Senior National Indoor.
Congratualtions to everyone and hopefully we can do even better next year.
Reports by James Mason
