Kenyan archers set sights on Paris Olympics slots

The National archery team handlers believe their performance at last month's Africa Open in Mauritius is a fascinating eye-opener in the hunt for 2024 Paris Olympic slots.

The African qualifier is slated for November 7 - 12 in Nabeul, Tunisia. 

In Mauritius, the six Kenyan archers bagged one silver in the women’s team event and a bronze medal in the mixed team event in a championship featuring 55 archers from nine countries. 

Led by coach Tabassum Anwar, Team Kenya featured trailblazing Olympian Shehzana Anwar, who finished second in the individual female ranking round.

Others were Agnes Kinyua (silver medalist team event), Diram Elema (silver medalist team event), Shehzana Anwar (silver medalist team event and bronze medalist mixed event), Rizwan Virji (bronze medalist team event), Edel Kawara and Alikhan Kazia.

The top two archers at the Tunisian event, both men and women, will qualify for Paris.

Tabassum said: “We set-up our national qualifier competition and national qualifier scores. Stage 1 of the national qualification event was held at the end of July at Strathmore University range.”

“Stage 2 counted as the scores accrued from the Mauritius extravaganza while Stage 3 will take place at the beginning of October. And with most archers now based in Nairobi, daily training has been ongoing after work."

"All our archers are employed, so we take that into consideration. Each archer has their own equipment but the need to upgrade is paramount even though funds are a big hurdle," she added.

“The biggest dream of any archery is to be a world champion and indeed to go to the Olympics. It has been done once by our very own Shehzana Anwar who, having won the 2016 Africa Championship, won the Summer Games slot for Kenya. The other two Kenyan qualifiers (Shamas Velani and Dominic Rebelo) got their slots through wildcards.”

Tabassum sees Kenyan archers breaking through in the World Championships.

“We have submitted our budget to the authorities in regard to preparation towards the Olympics, in which we have requested participation in three World Cup competitions," she added.

"To enable more Kenya archers realise their potential in the sport, we need to be funded to take them to expert training centres and camps. For the juniors, there has been a school training programme running under the tutelage of Shehzana.”

“Archers have to train hard in all sorts of conditions to counter judgment of arrow flight. All competitive archers need to compete in different parts of the world to master control of equipment and mental status,” expounds Tabassum.

“After achieving a set score/goal in training, they would then invest in professional equipment to be able to compete internationally. Then international competitions they will need to participate in are 70m for men, women, mixed teams, and gender teams of three archers. These are Olympic categories but there are many more. ”

Meanwhile, Tabassum has singled out weather as one facet of the sport they’ll not take.

“Wind was tremendous in Mauritius. We haven't witnessed such a kind of wind before. So, Mauritius was an eye-opener as arrows would not land where you aim," she said.

Kenya has one official archery range at the Strathmore University Sports Complex with another makeshift at Aga Khan Sports Club.