Duncan Busby's Blog

Last weekend I shot in the Finals of the National Series, this has been a fantastic set of tournaments. The finals were extremely well organised and were also unique event in the history of archery in Britain.

We were shooting using FITA's new format set system at 70m, I faced Liam Grimwood in the semi finals, which I won 7 set points to 5, this left me facing Chris White in the gold medal match.
This was an incredibly close match, where we both played our best games; very few points were dropped between us during this match. I eventually won 8 set points to 6 to take first place.

I hope that the National Series will continue for many years to come and will lead the way to promote professional archery in this country. Thanks go to Notty and everyone in the work parties for an amazing weekend.

This was the 5th and final leg of the National Series and a last chance to get some all important points for the finals.
This was a double FITA, the first day was overcast and a little breezy, despite this I feel I shot well, scoring 1386.
On the second day, the weather was still overcast, but there was no sign of that tricky breeze, Things started well with me equalling my 90m PB, things continued to go well for the rest of the round, my distance scores were 345, 353, 355, 359 giving me a total of 1412, this was a massive score and puts me in 6th place in the world for overall highest FITA scores.

This was still not enough to outdo Chris who shot an insane 1415! there were also three other 1400's shot, Liam and Andy Rik with 1402 and an amazing score of 1403 from Nicola Simpson. An unpresentented number of 1400's!

This second place finish puts me in 2nd place for the National Series Rankings and again leaves me facing Liam in the first round of the Final next weekend...

This was by far the most important event of the year, Korea was amazing and the temperatures were pleasantly hot.

After spending a few days acclimatising we shot a FITA in the qualification round, the tournament field had a very tricky and hard to read breeze which made the FITA hard work in the end I finished on 1370 which put me in 27th place, this was not the best of starts but did keep me in the top quarter.

We then had a few days of rest/practice before our elimination day. Again we had a light unpredictable breeze on the day which seemed to keep scores generally low, I got through my first match without a problem, my second match was a bit closer but I still got through this problem free, in my third match everything seemed to go right I put in a massive 118 to Braden's 113. this left me facing Liam in the 1/8th's, this was a very close match, we both tied on 115's so went through to a one arrow shoot-off in this we both shot 10's for our first arrow, then 9's for our second which took us to closest to the middle. Here both our arrows went low left; Liam's just inside the ten, mine just outside.
This meant I finished the tournament in 10th place.

During the team event, we had an easy first match against the Austrailians, we won this 230 to 225. We then faced the USA who put in a stellar 236 to our 230, this left us placed 5th overall.

Korea was an amazing experience and a reasonable finish for me but I hope to improve my position at the next one.

The weather for this weekend was windy with some rain on the first day, the national series part of the shoot was the 720 and head to head rounds on the Saturday.
The 720 was tricky and frustrating, I scored 690 which qualified me in second place.
Then came the match play, I shot solidly throughout despite the weather, my 12 arrow totals were 113, 116, 118, 116, 115 I finished the tournament in second place. This gave me more points towards my standing in the National Series ranking.

This was the 2nd leg of the National series which consisted of a 720, FITA and a 'fun' team round.
the Saturday started with the 720 round, the weather was reasonable and I shot 708 which was a new PB. This put me in first place. After the 720 was the team event.

On the Sunday was the FITA, the weather was not quite as nice as the first day, it was a little breezy. Despite this I managed a 1390 which put me in second place overall after Chris.
This helped my standing in the National Series and gave me points towards the final.

I attended the third stage of the World Cup in Turkey in June, the scenery was amazing and the weather was very hot.

During the qualification FITA the wind was a little tricky but not impossible to read, I scored a 1395, which put me in 5th place, I was pleased with this result, this also meant that as Nicky Hunt had also qualified in 5th place we were entered into the compound mixed team event.

The elimination round was again breezy but hot, my first match went well, I managed to win this with relative ease 117 to 110, my second match I went one point better putting in 118 to 115, during the 1/8th eliminations things got a little difficult as I had moved from one end of the shooting field to the other, the wind on this target was coming from a completely different direction and it took me my whole first end to correct my sight and by this time the damage had been done, I lost this match 113 to 117.
Leaving me in 16th position overall. I was a little disappointed at this finish but was looking forward to the compound mixed team event.

During this stage of the competition, Nicky and I faced Italy in the first round, they proved too strong winning the match 153 to 147, this left us to face the USA in the bronze medal match. We won this match 153 to 152, allowing us to take bronze.
I enjoyed this trip, it was a great introduction to the world cup and it was pretty awesome to see the shooting happening on the beach.