Paris Olympics 2024: What are Archery Ranking Round Rules, Regulations and Format

Archery at the Paris Olympics 2024 will begin on July 25 with the individual ranking rounds for both men and women. Post the ranking rounds, the competition will shift to a matchplay phase.

Understanding the rules of the ranking rounds for the sport is fairly simple. In total, 128 athletes have qualified for archery at the Summer Games, 64 men and 64 women. The ranking rounds provide all 128 archers with 72 arrows, with a target placed 70 meters away.

As the archers shoot, the highest score for each arrow is 10, with the perfect score being 720. In the ranking rounds, the 72 arrows are divided into 12 ‘ends’ consisting of six arrows each. Archers must complete one end within two minutes.

Post this, the competition moves to the matchplay phase, where the No.1 ranked archer from the ranking rounds faces the No. 64, the No. 2 faces No. 63, and so on. The individual ranking rounds are also used to determine the seedings of the men's, women's, and mixed-team elimination rounds.

At the Paris Olympics, the individual ranking rounds for archery take place on July 25, a day before the opening ceremony. The women's ranking round begins at 1:00 PM IST, while the men's round is scheduled for 5:45 PM.

Paris Olympics Archery: Matchplay phase rules explained

After the ranking rounds, the format of archery at the Paris Olympics 2024 will see a massive change. The matchplay phase will see archers go head-to-head as they compete against each other in high-stakes elimination matches.

Each match will follow the ‘best-of-five sets’ format, where each set consists of three arrows. The winner of each set receives two points, and if the scores in a set are tied, both archers receive a point each. If the score is tied at the end of the match, a single arrow shoot-off is used to determine the winner.

The format differs slightly for the team events. In the men's, women's, and mixed team events, each match consists of four sets, with each set consisting of six arrows divided equally between the two team members.