Archery Olympic Round

The Olympic Round was introduced to target archery so that it could become watchable as a competitive sport. The Main focus of this being for the Olympics when shown on television. The round was developed by the International Archery Federation FITA. It is used at the Olympic Games [ [http://en.beijing2008.cn/cptvenues/sports/archery/index.shtml Official Beijing Olympics Archery page] ] , the Archery World Cup [ [http://archery.org FITA Website] ] and in many lower profile or local tournaments.

Individual Event

A qualifying round will be shot in order to order the competitors and given a seeding. The qualifying round is usually a FITA 70m round, consisting of 72 arrows shot at a distance of 70 meters. These seeding are then sorted into head-to-head matches.

Each match consists of 4 ends of 3 arrows, giving a 12-arrow match shot at a distance of 70 meters on a 122cm target face. In early stages of the elimination rounds this may be changed to 2 ends of 6 arrows in order to save time. In later stages and at the Olympics and World Cup the shooting order alternates with each archer shooting one arrow at a time, having 40 seconds to shoot each arrow [ [http://archery.org/UserFiles/Document/FITA%20website/05%20Rules/01%20C&R%20Book/2008RulesENG_Book2.pdf FITA Outdoor Archery Rule book] ] . The highest placed athlete in the qualification round will decide the order of shooting of the first end. The athlete with the lowest cumulative score will shoot first the next end. If the athletes are tied, the athlete that shot first in the first end, shoots first in the next end. The archer with the highest score at the end of the 12 arrows is declared the winner.

Ties

In the event of a tie each archer shoots a single arrow, the archer with the highest scoring arrow wins. If there is still a tie a second single arrow is shot, and if need be a third. On the third arrow if there is still a tie the the archer with arrow closest to the center is the winner.

Fouls

If an archer shoots after their time of 40 seconds or at the wrong time they will lose their highest scoring arrow value.

Team Event

Teams are made up of three archers from the same discipline (male or female, recurve or compound). The teams shoot a qualifying round and are seeded on the combined score of the team.

A team match consists of 4 ends of each archer shooting 2 arrows, making 24 arrows in total. The team has 2 minutes to shoot all 6 arrows. All archers start in a box 1 meter from the shooting line. Once the time has started one archer may leave the box and shoot. Only one archer may be out of the box at a time.

Ties

In the event of tie, the each team member will shoot one arrow each. The team will have 1 minute to shoot the 3 arrows. The team with the highest combined is the winner. If still tied another 3 arrow are shot, and a third end if need be. If still tied in the third end the team with an arrow closest to the center of the target wins, if these are the same distance from the center the team with the second arrow closest arrow is the winner, and the third if need be.

Fouls

In addition to the fouls above there are additional fouls for the team round. If an archer leaves the box before the previous archer has entered the box the a 'foot fault' is a called and the archer must re-enter the box before leaving again. The archery must not remove an arrow from their quiver until they are on the shooting line, otherwise they must re-enter the box and return the arrow to their quiver before leaving again. For both of these fouls the judge will display a yellow card, if the archer does not obey the judge they will receive a red card and lose their highest scoring arrow.

References