In prep for Asiad, archers train at baseball stadium

These certainly haven’t been your average archery practice sessions, as South Korean archers prepping for the upcoming Asian Games in Incheon took their aim at targets set up on the field of a baseball stadium, with boisterous crowds making all sorts of noise.

Members of the recurve team took to the lines inside Mokdong Stadium in Seoul. The following day, those on the compound squad joined the fray at the same ballpark, which serves as the home of the Nexen Heroes in the Korea Baseball Organization.

Though archery competitions at the Asian Games or Olympics are usually held in quiet settings, fans in the stands at Mokdong were encouraged to make noise as they pleased. Loudspeakers also blared music, as the archers tried to concentrate on their targets.

These sessions may seem like a publicity gimmick for the sport, but they have been carefully designed to harden the archers for hostile environments at competitions.

South Korean archers have taken to the baseball stadiums since the end of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, where raucous Chinese crowds made headlines almost as much as the athletes themselves.

In the women’s individual final that year, the favored South Korean, Park Sung-hyun, clearly rattled by the setting, fell to Zhang Juanjuan of China, ending South Korea’s streak of victories in the discipline at six.

Then the sport’s officials here decided to prepare their archers for noisy environments by making them shoot at ballparks.

Despite that hiccup in Beijing, South Korea remains the world’s premier archery power. In the Asian Games alone, South Korea leads all nations, with 33 gold medals out of a possible 44.

The country is doing whatever it can to maintain that edge, and Jang Young-sool, head coach of the archery delegation, is a believer in these practices.

“I’ve seen national team regulars who have shot a zero or landed an arrow in someone else’s target because they got so nervous,” Jang said. “I think there’s a huge difference among archers who’ve experienced these situations and those who haven’t.”

The difference in experience clearly showed on Tuesday, when the session for the recurve team was held in a heavy rain that actually canceled the baseball game later that same evening.

The archers were introduced by the PA announcer one by one, much as they would be at the Asian Games. Then Ku Bon-chan, in his first ballpark practice, managed only a seven with crowd noise and loud music in the background. Ku later admitted he wasn’t feeling 100 percent comfortable in the setting.

Veterans of such practices went straight to the perfect 10. Oh Jin-hyek, the 2012 Olympic gold medalist, Kim Woo-jin, the 2011 world champ, and Lee Seung-yoon, the 2013 world champ, were all on top of their game.

“We got to train in a different environment and the weather also came into play,” Kim said. “I think it will make a positive impact on the whole team.”

The four female archers, Jung Dasomi, Chang Hye-jin, Lee Tuk-young and Joo Hyun-jung, were as consistent as they come, until the steady drizzle turned into a downpour.

The coaches actually welcome the inclement weather, saying the more difficult the conditions in practices, the better it is for the archers.

“We may have to compete in similar conditions at the Asian Games,” said Kim Seong-hoon, coach of the men’s team. “So this was an absolutely perfect day of practice for us.”

The compound archers on Wednesday trained under clear skies, but one of them, Youn So-jung on the women’s team, once missed her target entirely.

The compound event will be part of the Asian Games for the first time this year. The compound competition yields higher scores than the recurve event because bows are shot from 50 meters from the target, 20 meters closer than recurve, and the archers get to use the magnifying glass in the sight and pulleys on either end of the bow.

Since compound archery will be contested in the Asian Games for the first time this year and has never been part of the Olympics, South Korean archers in that discipline haven’t had to go through the ballpark drills that their recurve teammates have in recent years. The lack of familiarity wasn’t lost on Jang, the head coach.

“Our compound archers have never had to train in this setting until now,” Jang said. “What we take away from this today is that we put them through something entirely new and different.”

Youn said she learned her lesson the hard way.

“I am usually relaxed, but I think I was really thrown off in this unusual environment,” the 21-year-old said. “I was angry, but this was a good learning experience. I will make sure I won’t do anything like this at the Asian Games.” (Yonhap)