By Chad Love

Olympic shooting sports are suddenly hot. In the wake of Kim Rhode's amazing and historic gold in women's skeet she's getting a lot of much-deserved love in the press. But skeet is not the only feel-good story. The US men's archery team brought home our first medal of the games, winning silver in a dramatic, down-to-the-last-arrow match against Italy. Apparently, the excitement of the shootout has some sportswriters wishing the Olympics had more archery events.

From this story on slate.com:
Today’s tremendously exciting men's team archery finals—Italy over the USA with a bull’s-eye on the final arrow!—brought to mind a question that’s long been nagging at me: Would Olympic archers be any good at bow hunting?

It's a rhetorical question, as the writer goes on to explain how many of our current Olympian archers, including top-ranked Brady Ellison, are also ardent hunters. The point he's really trying to make is that we need to add field archery to the Olympics.

From the story: All of these archers/hunters seem like they’d be naturals at “field archery,” a sport that tries to bridge the gap between target shooting and bow hunting. In field archery competitions, targets of various shapes, colors, and sizes are set up in non-standardized outdoor courses, often in wooded terrain; archers must walk from target to target. A few target archers also compete in field archery. At the 2009 World Games in Taipei, former U.S. Olympic archer Vic Wunderle took gold in one of the field archery competitions, while Michele Frangilli, whose last-shot bull’s-eye today clinched Olympic gold for Team Italy, also did well. I’d watch the hell out of field archery if it were an Olympic sport. And if it did make it to the games, the Americans’ chances at taking home a gold medal might improve.

I would, too. Although I missed the US match, I did catch the equally dramatic, down-to-the-last-arrow duel between the China and South Korean women's teams (South Korea took it by one point). Who says archery can't be a spectator sport? I think field archery would be equally exciting. Who else would watch it?

While many American professional archers grew up shooting moving mammalian targets before transitioning to stationary targets, in other countries archery is almost exclusively a target sport. In order to get to the Olympics, though, field archery will need a strong, high-profile advocate. Are you paying attention, Ted Nugent?

Comments (6)

from CL3 wrote 45 weeks 6 days ago

Why not add a sporting clays event as well? Who doesn't love watching the shooting sports?! My 2-year old daughter was mesmerized with the skeet finals.

I bet a Field Archery course and Sporting Clays course would get some people really into the shooting sports.

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from 784512 wrote 45 weeks 5 days ago

sounds great. i would wach it

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from dtbc333 wrote 45 weeks 4 days ago

I would definitely watch it. I also missed the U.S. men's match and caught the China/S. Korea women's match and it was surprisingly exciting to watch. Wish they would have televised more of all of the shooting sports.

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from Savageshot wrote 45 weeks 3 days ago

Since hunting is where shoting and archery have its roots this only makes since. is it really that impressive if you can hit 99/100 clays with an already shouldered gun if you are unable to shoulder and then hit a dove or rabbit in the feild?

Not that 99/100 clays isnt impressive i couldnt do it today, but I find the latter more practical.

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from GrandSlamDreamer wrote 45 weeks 3 days ago

I did catch the men's final with USA vs. Italy and my girlfriend and I were actually holding our breaths as we were hoping that Italy would miss and we would at least go into a shoot-off. As the results show they lost, but the excitement was as high as almost any other sport we have watched since. If field archery were a sport, maybe I would go out and practice more than I currently do. Hey, we can all have dreams right?

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from bounty1 wrote 45 weeks 2 days ago

Sorry, but I say no. I don't know if anybody else noticed or maybe it's just me, but this year there seems to be an exceptionally large amount of whiny, crying, finger pointing, disqualify this one, that one, and the other one, for just about any reason they can think of. Tweeting, blogs, emails etc. and I'm thinking it's not gonna get any better through the years. The more events added the worse it'll get.

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from CL3 wrote 45 weeks 6 days ago

Why not add a sporting clays event as well? Who doesn't love watching the shooting sports?! My 2-year old daughter was mesmerized with the skeet finals.

I bet a Field Archery course and Sporting Clays course would get some people really into the shooting sports.

+2 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from 784512 wrote 45 weeks 5 days ago

sounds great. i would wach it

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from dtbc333 wrote 45 weeks 4 days ago

I would definitely watch it. I also missed the U.S. men's match and caught the China/S. Korea women's match and it was surprisingly exciting to watch. Wish they would have televised more of all of the shooting sports.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from Savageshot wrote 45 weeks 3 days ago

Since hunting is where shoting and archery have its roots this only makes since. is it really that impressive if you can hit 99/100 clays with an already shouldered gun if you are unable to shoulder and then hit a dove or rabbit in the feild?

Not that 99/100 clays isnt impressive i couldnt do it today, but I find the latter more practical.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from GrandSlamDreamer wrote 45 weeks 3 days ago

I did catch the men's final with USA vs. Italy and my girlfriend and I were actually holding our breaths as we were hoping that Italy would miss and we would at least go into a shoot-off. As the results show they lost, but the excitement was as high as almost any other sport we have watched since. If field archery were a sport, maybe I would go out and practice more than I currently do. Hey, we can all have dreams right?

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

from bounty1 wrote 45 weeks 2 days ago

Sorry, but I say no. I don't know if anybody else noticed or maybe it's just me, but this year there seems to be an exceptionally large amount of whiny, crying, finger pointing, disqualify this one, that one, and the other one, for just about any reason they can think of. Tweeting, blogs, emails etc. and I'm thinking it's not gonna get any better through the years. The more events added the worse it'll get.

0 Good Comment? Yes | No | Report

Post a Comment

 

All submitted comments are subject to the rules set forth in our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.