Antalya, Turkey (June 16, 2024) – Canada’s men’s recurve archery team come up short on their goal of obtaining a team qualification spot for Canada at the “Archery in Paris” Final Qualification Tournament in Antalya, Turkey on Saturday, June 15, falling to Uzbekistan in the round of 1/12. They have one final chance to qualify a team for the Olympics at the Archery World Cup competition that begins this week at the same venue.

The team of Eric Peters of Kitchener, ON, Devaang Gupta of Toronto, and Reece Wilson-Poyton of St. Catherine’s, ON were sitting 13th following the qualification rounds after having a bit of a rough start in the qualifying rounds and battling through the hot and windy conditions at the venue.

In the 1/12 round match against Uzbekistan, Canada started off strong, leading the match 4-2 at the halfway point. Uzbekistan came back strong in the second half however to take the match to a final shoot-out where Canada unfortunately came out on the losing end, giving Uzbekistan the win 4-5.

“We went out there and we really attacked the shots and we gave it everything we could, and it just didn’t work out for us,” said Peters following the match. “In through the first four ends of scoring, it was just up and down. We had some good ends. We had some bad ends, each of us, individually and as a whole team, and Uzbekistan was shooting great – they’re a really good group of shooters. We would normally be expected to beat them, but archery is a ‘who has it that day’ sort of game, and it just wasn’t our day.”

Virginie Chénier (Montreal, QC) and Stephanie Barrett (Toronto, ON) have now joined the men’s team for the World Cup competition this week as they look to secure their selection for the women’s individual quota spot that was secured earlier this year. Brandon Xuereb of Montreal, QC will replace Wilson-Poyton in the men’s team.

The stakes are high for the men’s team as there is only one spot left for Paris 2024 – for the highest ranked, not already qualified team on the World Rankings.

“If we win the World Cup, I think we’re safe. If we are in the final and we don’t win it, we might be safe. If we’re not in the final, I don’t think we’re safe,” commented National Team Advisory Ron Van der Hoff on the team’s chances. “We need to be in that gold medal final at the World Cup to have a chance. In Korea, we were third, which is very close to a final, so it’s possible, but it’s going to be a tall order and with the added pressure of the spot (on the line).”

Peters added: “We have the one spot (for Paris) which is fairly normal for us, but it would be great to send three. We haven’t had three since the Beijing Games in 2008. So, while it would be great, we’re going to be realistic about our odds and we’re going to go in and commit fully and just give it our 100% and if it works, it works, and if it doesn’t, it doesn’t. It’s going to be hard, for sure, if it doesn’t happen, but we all knew that this was always going to be hard.”

The final world rankings will be released on Monday, June 24th.

For full results from the Final Qualification Tournament, please click here.

For more information, including results, for the Antalya 2024 Hyundai Archery World Cup, please click here.