Lim Sihyeon opens archery explosively

South Korea’s Lim Sihyeon, 21, broke Olympic and world records at the Paris Games by scoring 694 points in archery in the qualifying round, the best female record in history.

In yesterday’s session, held on the Esplanade des Invalides, Lim Sihyeon achieved a record in the 70 metres with 72 arrows. Her 694 points are two points better than the current world record and 14 points better than the Olympic record, held by fellow Koreans Kang Chaeyoung in 2019 and An San in 2021, respectively.

Sihyeon, currently ranked number two in the world, holds a team gold medal from the 2023 world championships and a singles bronze from the same year.

The South Korean has an impressive percentage of duels won (89%) and a score of 9.4 out of 10 for each arrow throw.

The best Mexican

Alejandra Valencia hugged her teammates, Ana Paula Vázquez and Ángela Ruiz, when they finished third in the archery qualifying round.

The women’s archery team finished in third place, but in that embrace the legend of Mexican sport burst into tears. She fanned herself, laughing to try to drown her tears.

But above all, Alejandra Valencia cried.

“Knowing that we are there and everything that it has cost us… it shows. They are tears of emotion, because I didn’t feel like I was shooting well. I felt like I could shoot more, but they supported me. And they also found strength for the team,” she said about her performance and that of Vázquez and Ruiz.

However, despite her feelings, Alejandra Valencia finished eighth with her best score of the season (669 points).

With her tears dried, Alejandra Valencia was able to better analyze what they had achieved in the ranking round.

“We did well and we overcame adversity more than anything else. It was a very intense round. It was more than anything the emotion of knowing that my teammates were there too. And right now that is the driving force. It is part of the unity. We want that medal, but everyone wants it,” Valencia concluded, excited, but with her sights set on continuing to make history for Mexico.

In the next round of the individual competition, Valencia will face the American Jennifer Mucino, Vázquez the German Charline Schwarz and Ruiz the British Brynony Pitman.

Near the top 10

In the men’s category, Mexican archer Matías Grande had a remarkable classification in which he improved and ended up occupying the eleventh position with a total of 676 points. For his part, Bruno Martínez got into the top 50 by climbing to position 44 with a total of 653 points; while Carlos Rojas managed to improve his position with his last 12 arrows and climbed to position number 55 with 643 points.

In total, the Mexican archers scored 1,972 points from 72 arrows shot individually, placing them in ninth place as a team behind Japan, which finished with the same total of points but had more 10’s and X’s hit.

The competition was dominated by the Koreans who secured the 1-2 with Kim Woojin (686) and Kim Je-deok (682) respectively. The third seed was taken by the German Florian Unruh with 681 points, followed by the Indian archer Dhiraj Bommadevara and the Korean Lee Wooseok who finished with the same number of points.—EFE and AP

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