Archers find peak form | Northland Sport | Surfing, Rugby, Soccer, Football, Cricket in Northland

Archers competing at the National Field Archery Championships  at Mt Tiger over the weekend got the kind of conditions they needed to amass some handy totals, with four national records broken over the two-day shoot.

Mt  Tiger's Terry Hand broke two of the records, while Massey's Linda Lainchbury and Mike Lainchbury broke one apiece.

Despite big concerns going into the weekend that the weather would make shooting on the Mt Tiger course - one of the most challenging field courses in the Southern Hemisphere - extremely difficult, the forecasters were proved wrong.

One of the event organisers, Cheryl Irvine, said the club members were relieved that the expected  rain did  not fall.

"It was a very successful weekend. The good weather helped immensely. It was almost what you'd call ideal shooting conditions - it wasn't too hot or cold and there was very little wind - and that was backed up by some of the scores we had," she said.

In all, seven shooters recorded scores of 1300 points or better out of a possible 1400. The best shooters on the course were overall champion Massey's Shaun Teesdale, Mt Tiger's Trevor Irvine and Linda Lainchbury.

Teesdale was the highest overall points scorer  with 1362. In all there were 17 divisions - with each now boasting a new national champion.

"There was an excellent standard of shooting - the highest for a number of years - and that's mainly because people are getting themselves geared up for the World Championships in Germany in July and four of our top shooters will attend that - so this was their last training ground at this level," Irvine said.

There is also a world bowhunter tournament in Australia next year and plenty of the shooters - particularly members of the local club - are getting active in wanting to qualify for New Zealand team selection.

The weekend's course consisted of three rounds - two on Saturday, the 28-target marked field round and a 14-target marked animal round, and a 28-target marked hunter round on Sunday.

The targets are set out on the course starting at the base of Mt Tiger, going over the top of the hill and back  on to the flat.

"We virtually climb, shoot a target, score the arrows, move on to the next target further up the hill - shoot again - score and keep climbing - then do the same coming down the mountain," said  Irvine.

 Full results: P9