Great Britain have come home with one silver and two bronze medals from the 2024 World Field Championships.
At the highlight international field competition of the year, the team from GB make their mark in Lac La Biche, Canada. The finals field displayed a very different, challenging target to the ones the athletes had shot on the courses through the week, as the boss was elevated up in the air by a crane.
Barebow U21 man, Ollie Hicks, earned his first ever World Field Championships medal. After ranking in third place with a score of 687, he made his way through the head-to-heads up to the gold final. He faced first ranked Ludvig Rohlin from Sweden in the battle for the Championship title. Going into the fourth and final end, Ollie was only trailing by one point, but a 12-point end by Rohlin was enough to take the win, 51-47.
Ollie told us: "I'm really pleased to come away with my first World Championship medal. The finals was fun. It was interesting shooting up at a crane with no ground around it."
Ollie Hicks shooting at the target in the sky during his gold final.
Ella Gibson returned to the World Field finals, getting a second chance to win the bronze medal which she narrowly missed out on in 2022. This year her opponent was previous GB teammate, Bayley Sargeant Buden from Croatia. The two archers swapped the advantage between them as they shot through the ends, with Ella taking a one point lead going into the last three arrows. Both women shot 15 points apiece, giving Ella the bronze medal, 60-59.
Ella said: "I was really happy to win my first ever senior World Championships medal. Of course, you always want more than bronze, but I'm really happy to walk away with a medal. I don't feel like I shot my best in my individual final, but sometimes we win pretty and sometimes we just win. It was a great week with the whole team, I feel like everyone gelled really well and enjoyed each other's company."
Ella Gibson shooting for World bronze
In the compound mixed team competition, Ella Gibson was joined by compound man Jake Walsh. As a pair, they ranked in second place, just behind the duo from America. After losing to Slovenia in the semi-final, GB then went into the bronze match against the Croatians. In a truly impressive showdown, both teams nearly matched each other end for end, finishing on a tie with 90-90. Croatia shot two fives, but a four and a six from GB gave them the arrow which was closest to the centre, and they won the bronze.
Ella added: "I really enjoyed shooting mixed team with Jake, as we'd never shot together before. Seeing how excited he was to win a medal was so nice because I think sometimes we take it for granted or get used to winning medals at events, so that was actually a really nice experience."
Compound mixed team, Ella Gibson and Jake Walsh
GB have also won all the possible quota spots up for grabs this week for the 2025 World Games: a recurve woman, recurve man, and a barebow man! This takes GB's total World Games spaces to four along with a compound women's spot which was won earlier this year at the European Championships. The World Games will take place in Chengdu, China in August 2025.
