NAMIBIA’S archery team set several records and collected a mammoth 17 medals to win the African Archery Championships in Morocco on Friday.
The six Namibian archers are now the continental champions in their respective divisions, while the men also won the team division.Namibia’s 225 points amassed against Morocco is a new African record in the Men’s Compound Division.Female Namibian archer Iroleen von Litzenborg-Page set two new continental records. She now holds the new Africa record in the compound round for women for her 650 points as well as the record in the compound elimination round after scoring 136.South Africa’s Petrus Marx set two records. He shot a new record score in the compound round (685) and also a new record in the compound elimination round (147 out of possible 150). This team was the most successful archery team from Namibia ever competing at an international event, said Archery Namibia’s Frank Bockmühl.’The results again prove that consistent activity on the national level eventually leads to desired results,’ said Bockmühl.’Congratulations to all the archers and their coach, Marja Woortman. You did us all proud when you received your medals under our national flag and to the sound of our national anthem,’ he added. The competition started last week Monday with a full compound round (72 arrows at 50 m distance) and ended on Friday. During this week, as part of the seeding, two additional competitions were held. The first was the ‘African Open’, which featured teams from Iraq, Belgium, Poland and Switzerland in competition with the teams from Africa. The other was a competition reserved only for African Commonwealth Games countrie, which ended on Thursday.On Friday, the team and individual champions were determined by one-on-one matches, with the winner proceeding to the next round. Again this was a most successful day for Namibia, especially since it was the first time that a Namibian archer, Francois Marais, beat the South African top-ranked compound archer to become the new African Continental Champion.The next championships take place in 2014.Full Results2012 African Open Archery ChampionshipsMen Compound – Petrus Marx, RSA (gold), Francois Marais, Namibia (silver), Lesley PageNamibia (bronze);Women Compound – Beanta Viviers, Namibia (gold), Iroleen von Litzenborg-Page, Namibia (silver), Beatrix van der Merwe, Namibia (bronze);Men Compound Team – Namibia, three archers (gold), Egypt (silver), Morocco (bronze);African Commonwealth Games CountriesMen Compound – Petrus Marx, RSA (gold), Francois Marais, Namibia (silver), Lesley Page, Namibia (bronze); Women Compound – Iroleen von Litzenborg-Page, Namibia (gold), Beanta Viviers, Namibia (silver), Beatrix van der Merwe, Namibia (bronze);African Continental Archery ChampionshipsMen Compound – Francois Marais, Namibia (gold); Petrus Marx, RSA (silver), Louw Nel, Namibia (bronze);Women Compound – Beanta Viviers, Namibia (gold), Iroleen von Litzenborg-Page, Namibia (silver), Beatrix van der Merwe, Namibia (bronze); Men Compound Team – Namibia (gold), Egypt (silver), Morocco (bronze).
