On 12/6/16 a small team (Denis Alston, Grant Hazelton, Richard Cadwallader and Paul Harding) representing Fleet Ibex competed in a highly enjoyable traditional Nepalese archery competition at Cody Sports and Social Club in Farnborough.
It took most of the morning to understand the rules but in essence, the actual shooting and scoring was very straight-forward. The target is about 6ft high and about 15 inches wide and each archer shot two arrows from a standard distance (38 yards). Every hit scored one point with a bonus point if you hit the bulls eye about the size of a 50p coin. From 38 yards this is not easy although throughthe course of the day we did get about 5 bulls eyes - all by Nepalese archers of course! The competition was for 8 teams of 4 archers with each shooting 2 x 2 x 4 = 16 arrows so, ignoring the bulls eyes, the maximum score is 16 for individuals and 64 for the team. The complications arose when money started changing hands. Everyone had to put in 50p every time someone hit the bulls eye although who got this is anyone's guess - as none of us hit the bull we didn't see our money again!!
There were 4 Nepalese teams and 4 British teams. The 4 Nepalese teams, naturally, came 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th followed by Fleet Ibex, Cody Archers, SPTA and Longbow Heritage at 5th, 6th, 7th and 8threspectively. There were individual prizes for some of the non-Nepalese competitors. Denis on best score (14/16) (with Grant in second place also with 14/16 after a tie breaker), Micky Pearce (Longbow Heritage) won a prize as the oldest archer (!!) with Angharad Thomas (SPTA) as the youngest. It was perhaps fitting that Denis won his category as it was his birthday (21 again??) and the prize was a traditional Nepalese bamboo bow and two arrows
An interesting feature was that barracking, shouting and whistling whilst archers were shooting was not only permitted it was positively encouraged. Perhaps something we could introduce to our shoots!! It was a little un-nerving to shoot with everyone watching and shouting!!
Many thanks to our hosts - the Everest Archery Club UK - who organised the event and BBQ and to Glenn for organising the Ibex and Cody Teams.
