Asian Archery Championships 2013: India finish second overall after a strong final two days

Deepika Kumari (left) and Jayanta Talukdar who picked up gold in the mixed team recurve event

The Indian compound contingent continued their fine showing at the Asian Archery Championships on the penultimate day as they picked up a gold, silver and bronze each to add to their tally.

The mixed compound team of Abhishek Verma and Lily Chanu beat the Iranian team by one point to emerge victorious in the championship match and claim gold.

Abhishek couldn’t quite repeat the feat in the individual event as he lost out to Iran’s Hamzah Nekoeei 141-144 to take the silver.The Indian men were very impressive in the individual compound event too as three of them made it to the quarter-finals.

All three of them, in fact, fell to the eventual champion Nekoeei. Rajat Chouhan lost out narrowly by a single point to the Iranian in the quarter-finals and in the semi’s Sandeep Kumar was tied with the Iranian at 144, but Nekoeei hit the bull’s eye, which got him through to the final.

Sandeep did pick up the bronze with a comprehensive 146-141 win over Thailand’s Chanchai Wong.

Riding on the back of the compound team’s performance, the recurve archers alos added to the medal tally on Saturday as they clinched one gold and one bronze each.

The mixed team of Jayanta Talukdar and Deepika Kumari defeated the world champion Korean team 146-141 to take gold.

And in the women’s individual event, Laishram Bombayla Devi won bronze beating another Korean archer in Joo Hyun Jung. Deepika Kumari and Dola Banerjee on the other hand suffered early exits.

So did the men in the individual category as Asian Games silver medalist Tarundeep Rai and World Cup Final bronze medalist Jayanta Talukdar were both knocked out in the round of 32.

India ended the championships in second place overall with three gold, one silver and two bronze medals.

Asian Archery Championships – final standings