The Namibian Archery Team departed for the 9th African Archery Championships in Morocco on Friday, 9 March. Archery in Namibia has consistently participated in the bi-annual African Archery Championships since 2006.
Archers from Namibia won several medals during these events. During 2010 in Egypt, a gold medal was won by the Compound Men Team, while two silver medals and one bronze medal was won by individual archers from Namibia.
This year, the prestigious event will be hosted in Morocco, between 11 and 16 March and the Archery Association of Namibia (AAN) has again identified a group of promising archers to take part and represent Namibia. The AAN nominated two teams (one men compound, one women compound). This will be the first time that a full women team from Namibia will be participating at this event.
Based on the last 12 months’ 50m scores, the following archers were selected to represent Namibia at the games. They are: Compound Women: Iroleen Page (weighted score 323.2), Beanta Viviers with a score of 318, and Beatrix van der Merwe who recorded a score of 310.5. The male team consist of Francois Marais with a score of 342.25, Louw Nel with 334.85 and Lesley Page with a score of 331.35.
During the past month, intensive preparations of the team took place in both Windhoek and Walvis Bay with special emphasis on team events, which involves some tight timing exercises. Individual scores have also consistently improved during this time.
National Colours were awarded by the Namibian Sports Commission. The team will be accompanied by the National Coach, Marja Woortman. The team’s manager is Frank Bockmühl, who will also attend the Annual Congress of the Federation of African Archery (FAA) which is being held simultaneously. Bockmühl, said the archers are well prepared.
The team will leave Windhoek on 9 March and will reach Rabat via Johannesburg and Paris, and will arrive back in Windhoek again on 18 March.
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