National Tour Archery Finals set for Caldicot Castle

Olympian Naomi Folkard will be among 32 archers battling to become National Tour champion this weekend as the season finals head to Caldicot Castle.

The Monmouthshire castle will play host to an Olympic and Paralympic-style archery arena across Saturday and Sunday, with men’s and women’s compound and recurve action highlighting the event.

Sunday will see four-time Olympian Folkard compete alongside fellow European Games champions Sarah Bettles and Bryony Pitman for recurve honours, with the latter looking to defend her crown.

Also out to maintain his recurve title is Alex Wise, whose performances at the summer’s World Championships helped secure Team GB an Olympic quota place for Tokyo 2020.

He’ll be doing battle with UK number one and teammate Tom Hall, a man who has shown strong improvement and form throughout 2019.

Before that, however, comes the compound finals with World Cup mixed team gold medallist James Mason putting last year’s honour on the line on Saturday.

The in-form Ella Gibson will be looking to add the National Tour title to her World Cup mixed team gold and team silver this year. Ella will be competing against her fellow silver medal winning team mates Susan Corless and Sarah Moon, as well as UK number one Sarah Prieels.

All four events begin at the quarter-final stage, with those who successfully come through three matches crowned one of four 2019 Archery GB National Tour Champions inside the walls of Caldicot Castle.

“It’s been an exceptional year for us with British archers displaying an impressive level of talent in both home and international competitions, with six Olympic and five Paralympic quota places already secured for Tokyo, along with numerous international titles from World and European events,” said Neil Armitage, Archery GB CEO.

“We are expecting an exciting battle for the title of National Tour Champion within each category.”