2008 Olympics Updates

It has been a fantastically successful Olympics for Team GB, and as I’ve watched the cyclists and the sailors enjoying the limelight, I suppose I cannot help reflect on the disappointment that GB’s six archers will be returning home empty-handed.

I think the reason Archery GB has been so flat is that expectations were so high, and it is to the credit of our archers that that was so. Alison Williamson, Alan Wills et al have all performed so well on the international stage over the past four years that observers such as myself started to become too confident.

It all started with a bronze for Alison at Athens in 2004, and a fourth place finish for Larry Godfrey. Since then, they have won a number of medals at various international competitions, ranging from world and European championships, to World Cup tournaments. And not for nothing are our women’s team ranked second in the world, and the men fifth.

Last year, British archers won a silver medal and two bronze at the World Championships in Leipzig, but alas, it wasn’t the Olympic Games, and therefore that fantastic achievement went relatively unreported. Win a medal at the Olympics and suddenly a cascade of journalists are battering the door down for interviews, and for a minority sport like archery, publicity of that kind is a wonderful chance to further raise the profile of the sport.

But the Olympic Games is the gauge by which the success of the sport is measured, and the archers missed their opportunity - though the trio of Alison, Naomi Folkard and Charlotte Burgess provided tremendous theatre in the team tournament when they came so agonisingly close to a medal on the first Sunday. After that, we faded from the scene, and that was a disappointment, of course.

So where do we go from here? Well, as I said, British archery has had a tremendous three years, and looking ahead, there are a good crop of youngsters waiting to break through, and snapping at the heels of the seniors in the countdown to London 2012.

First things first, though, and we will all be cheering on our Paralympic archers in Beijing, and while I should learn the lesson of being too optimistic, I cannot help myself by reporting that we have a great squad and every chance of winning medals.

In the first week of September, the World Field Archery Championship takes place at Llwynypia, near Cardiff, with hundreds of archers from all over the world descending on South Wales for a week long tournament.

We also have one of our compound archers - Nichola Simpson - taking part in the Fita World Cup Grand Final in Lausanne in October, which everyone is looking forward to. It is the third year running (and the World Cup only began in 2006) that a GB archer has made it to the Grand Final (Alan Wills won a bronze medal last year, Alison Williamson finished fourth the year before).

After that, there will be a review of the Olympic experience in October, with officials, coaches and, of course, the archers themselves, all contributing to a far-reaching assessment and analysis of the good and the bad of Beijing. I have little doubt there will be plenty of straight-talking, but constructive, rather than destructive.

Oh, and there is the question of funding. It is extremely premature to speculate one way or t’other about this, because the simple fact is that nobody knows at this stage - though I accept that the lack of medal success makes it an inevitable question.

I don’t know the politics of funding, but what I do know is that the setting up of a Performance Unit by Archery GB three years ago, and the consistently improving performances at international level since Athens four years ago, suggests that the long term strategy is on the right lines.

Olympic Green Archery Field

A bit like the sailors at currently windless Qingdao, Britain’s medal tally has hit the doldrums over the last couple of days.

There was concern this first week was going to be slow, and to be honest, so it has proved.

Apart from the swimmers, who’ve had a great Olympics, and the cycling team who will undoubtedly be Britain’s biggest providers, there’s been disappointment elsewhere.

Nothing out of judo, diving, badminton, tennis, shooting - and now archery, where I’ve been spending my time over the last few days.

Archery had a target of two medals, and managed only a 4th place in the women’s team event.

Let’s add some context to that.

Last year was a particularly good one for the British archers, winning three medals at the World Championships, but it’s here in Beijing where it really counts, where the fruits of their labours, and the £2.8m investment the sport’s had in the past four years should be reaped.

What’s gone wrong?

Alan Wills offered me an insight straight after bowing out in the last 16 this morning.

He told me the head coach, Peter Suk, wasn’t letting him “be himself” out on the target field.

He wanted to feel more aggression, but felt that his personality was being subdued, because Suk wanted a calmer approach.

Team-mate Simon Terry mentioned “issues around the team” the other day, and clearly that’s what he was alluding to.

I’m left to question why wasn’t this resolved before the games?

If Wills wasn’t getting what he personally needed, then why?

After all he’s the bloke out there drawing the bow.

Whether this is a management or a communication issue, I don’t know, but the net result is a flat team, flat performances and a zero in the medals column.

Team leader, Hilda Gibson, said that there’d be a chance to get all this out into the open at a big de-brief post games.

Fine, but forgive me, too late for Terry, who said he’d not got his head around the one-on-one contests yet, or Naomi Folkard who let nervousness get in the way of her talent.

If ever a sport needed a good psychologist to give them strategies for dealing with those things, it’s archery.

Like target shooting, it’s a sport you play as much against yourself as the person standing next to you.

The Grand National Archery Society has some thinking to do, as do the other sports who’ve missed their medal targets here.

UK Sport has a much publicised “no compromise” policy when it comes to funding sport.

Archery will be among those nervously awaiting the outcome of the divvy-up of cash for London 2012.

Watching sport should be fun. And usually it is. Unless you’re watching an event where you have a vested interest.

Like Sunday’s women’s archery team tournament at the Olympics in Beijing.

As the media adviser to Archery GB, I know Alison Williamson, Naomi Folkard and Charlotte Burgess, and have a great deal of time and respect for all three of them.

So obviously I was willing them to win a medal. Gold was a tall order - the Koreans are quite simply phenomenal, but silver was a possibility; bronze I’d have settled for.

Alas, they left empty handed, after defeats to China in the semi-finals, and then France in the bronze medal shoot-off. I was mortified.

But if I was disappointed, then how must Alison, Naomi and Charlotte have felt? The tears said it all.

I think what made this even more disappointing is that I know that Alison, Naomi and Charlotte justify their world ranking of number two, and if I am totally honest I suppose my expectations were high.

But that reflects the faith I have in all three of them. Oh, and if I’m brutally honest, I was also thinking of the great publicity and profile for archery that winning a medal would bring!

That said, it was wonderful to see archer featuring on live television. And though the result wasn’t what we wanted, it was certainly a gripping watch, when I could bear to look!

But I am an eternal optimist, and the three Brits will bounce back. Indeed, sometimes a kick in the proverbial teeth can make you more resolute, and I have no doubt that they will turn up for the individual tournament in the week more determined than ever.

Monday is the men’s team tournament.

Alan Wills, Simon Terry and Larry Godfrey won silver at the World Championships last year, and they have the ability individually and collectively make up for Sunday’s disappointment.

I’ll be a cheerleader in chief once again. But will I able to cope with the tension?

Thunder and lightning, deafening chants from raucous spectators, torrential storms and, in the end, tears.

I had no idea archery could be like this.

Midway through the afternoon, word had whistled round the Brits in Beijing that Alison Williamson, Naomi Folkard and Charlotte Burgess were within touching-distance of GB’s first medal of these Olympics.

In their way stood China. And that’s where the trouble started.

You could hear the stadium almost before you could see it. Packed into the steeply-sided stands were thousands of headband-wearing, face-painted China fans, knee-deep in an ear-splitting shout-off with the thousands of South Korea fans who filled almost every other seat.

You could have forgiven the British trio if they’d taken one step onto the narrow v-shaped field for the semi-final and then fled for their lives.

Drums were beating. Flags were waving. Songs were being sung with such gusto that the sickly sounds of Shania Twain coming over the PA system were completely drowned out.

The only Briton visible in the stands was BOA chairman Colin Moynihan, and only then because there was a small child sitting in front of him.

Williamson, however, is made from stern stuff. This was her fifth appearance at an Olympics, and initially she and her young team-mates matched the home favourites point for point.

Folkard, a dead-eyed former music student, led the way with a perfect 10 into the gold with her first arrow. Burgess, who wears the same lucky pair of socks for every competition, ignored the gusting winds to keep Britain in it after 12 of the 24 shots.

Every arrow that China landed, meanwhile, was greeted by roars of delight from the partisan crowd.

Juanjuan Zhang, pulling the bowstring tight into her right cheek, began to pile on the pressure as the first rumble of thunder sounded overhead.

As the third end developed, the Brits began to waver. With the wind rising in strength, Folkard fired in a six and grimaced in frustration. Williamson followed that with a seven before Burgess did the same.

The crowd smelt blood. Ling Cheng landed an eight, Dan Guo a 10 as the rain began to fall. When Zhang sent her arrow soaring the 70 metres into the outer gold ring for a nine, the British dream of a gold medal match against the Koreans began to fade.

Still, you thought - there was always the bronze up for grabs. And with opponents France having qualified only fifth compared to Britain’s second, it was still odds-on that the girls would soon be celebrating GB’s first Beijing medal.

At that point, the sky turned black. Lightning crackled down in fearsome jags, thunder exploding overhead. Rain smashed down in bucket-sized lumps.

Forked lightning and long bows made from carbon not being a great combination, the archers ran for cover.

Small lakes appeared on the in-field. The rest of Olympic Green disappeared in the grey murk until the only thing visible were the floodlights overhead.

The fans simply donned the free plastic ponchos being dished out by the uber-efficient organisers and carried on as noisily as before.

That’s the way it stayed for almost an hour. In that time, news came through of Nicole Cooke’s soggy triumph a few miles away across the sodden city.

Right. So the archers weren’t going to win Britain’s first medal. They weren’t going to win a gold or silver. But the French were still there to be beaten, non?

From the very first arrow it was knee-knockingly close. Burgess wobbled with a six but was rescued by Williamson’s 9. France went seven, eight, nine to give Britain a slender lead of 48-46 a quarter of the way through.

Suddenly the French archers began to find their range. Berengere Schuh pinged in a 10, Virginie Arnold and Sophie Dodemont a nine apiece.

97-97 at halfway.

Folkard straightened out her floppy blue sunhat and hit back with a 10. Burgess followed suit. France matched them nervelessly. 125-125.

Folkard fired off an eight into the inner red ring. Williamson, her eyes shaded by a low-slung golf visor, drifted left and picked up just a seven. Burgess buried hers in the outer gold for a vital nine.

Unfortunately, the French trio were accelerating. They went 9, 8, 8 to move into the lead for the first time, and then stretched their lead to three points with just three arrows remaining per team as Arnold nailed an inner gold, screamed with delight and high-fived her team-mates.

Williamson, who gave up her job as a primary school teacher to concentrate on these Olympics, then somehow produced a 10 with her final arrow to leave France 25 points from the bronze.

The crowd howled with excitement. Moynihan shifted in his seat. The rain started up again.

It made no difference. Schuh, blinking behind her glasses, picked off an eight when seven would have done, and suddenly it was over.

No first medal. No national anthem. No big headlines in the papers back home.

Afterwards, both Williamson and Folkard were in tears, even as the stadium rocked to the sound of Korea dismantling China in an epic final.

Williamson seemed to be blaming herself, saying she had let the side down even if her team-mates tried telling her different.

Two points were all that separated them from the podium at the end. But when you’ve gone for gold and ended up with nothing there’s very little consolation to be had.

This weekend, Britain’s Olympic archers will be heading off to Macau to begin final preparations for Beijing.

Alan Wills, Larry Godfrey, Simon Terry, Alison Williamson, Naomi Folkard and Charlotte Burgess will be carrying British hopes of medals in this competition, and I genuinely believe they have prospects, both in the individual events, and certainly in the team tournaments.

They, and the 12 Paralympians who will be heading off later in August, were given a hearty send-off last weekend, with a big barbeque reception, and it was hard not to be excited on their behalf.

Just by qualifying to take part, they have achieved what most of us can only ever dream of.

It was a pleasant evening, enjoyed by all, with the archers looking relaxed and confident, while partners, parents and other family members looked on with great pride.

And isn’t it always interesting what you find out about people and their families at these kinds of events? You know the sort of thing I mean - talents that we never knew existed. On this occasion, credit must go to head coach Peter Suk and his wife, who proved themselves a musical couple of some note.

Peter Suk has done an outstanding job in the past three years and his impact is already making its mark in the countdown to the London 2012 Olympics, with the names Emma Downie and Tom Barber springing immediately to mind.

Both of them are reserves for this Olympics, but both have enormous potential, and - all things being equal - will be starting to make their impact felt over the next few years on the international stage, which they have already trodden with distinction.

Emma only took up archery six years ago, and after her raw and natural talent was spotted early on, Peter Suk has spent much time helping her continual development.

He has also invested much time and effort into the development of Tom, who’s just 16, but a young man who can really make his mark over the next few years.

They are two to look out for in the longer term, but for now the attention is on the immediate future, and Beijing next month.

Nobody underestimates the task at hand, and the competition will be intense - but our archers are well prepared, determined, and confident in their own form and ability.

And hopefully that will be the cue for another pleasant barbeque on the terrace at Lilleshall, this time to raise a glass in celebration.