ECAA

The venue was again the ground of Andover Archers and the weather was reasonable, with light overcast clouds and a wind that blew steadily into the faces of the competitors. The temperature was  on the cool side, but OK if you were shooting. York and Hereford rounds were shot.

A new system of calculating the winning places was in force this year – Team Managers would compile a running total of team scores every two dozen arrows, which would be posted on the results board – and at the finish their scores would be used without checking. This should have speeded up the medal giving ceremony, as the individual scores would be checked by the organisers afterwards.

This system meant that the results board was continuously updated, and it told an interesting story. The Recurve team was placed first at the end of the first two dozen and stayed there throughout the competition with the margin between them and second place getting bigger as each score was posted.

There was a different story for the Compound team. At the end of the first two dozen they were in joint second place, but had slipped to third by the fourth dozen. They then started to pull themselves back into contention and every two dozen the gap between them and Hampshire, who had been leading from the start, got smaller. They got back to second place, and then with only the last two dozen arrows left they were just 2 points behind the leaders.

At the end of the competition the leader board was abandoned, so only the organisers knew what the final scores were.

The presentation ceremony got under-way quickly due to the new system and the Recurve positions were;

3^rd place – Oxford 4134, 2^nd place – Hampshire 4143, 1^st place – Essex – 4379, a not exactly unexpected placing for Essex, but a close competition between Oxford and Hampshire.

Nail-biting time for me and the team  when the Compound results were announced; 3^rd place – Hertfordshire 4774, 2^nd place ----- Hampshire 4856 ( Oh yeah!!!! – well done), 1^st place Essex – 4876. The Compound team were pleased with themselves for a hard worked recovery, and there was a quiet satisfaction in the entire team that they had won both disciplines. A good conclusion to a long day.

Team Results;

                        Compound                                           Recurve

 Anna King                   144, 1240, 117            Matt Webb                    144, 1110, 74

James King                   144, 1224, 111            Yvonne Wade               143, 1107, 75

Pat Spragg                    144, 1224, 110            Neil Smith                    144, 1106, 65

Warren Stroud              144, 1188,  95             Derek Lawless  144, 1056, 61

Steve Spragg                143, 1149,  86             Martin Skinner 143, 1049, 59

My congratulations and thanks go to all team members for their time and efforts on the day. They supported each other well and performed splendidly – and got due reward. My thanks also to Peter Wade, for helping me with the running scores.

Peter Walker

Team Manager