A week that started with Jyothi Surekha Vennam setting a new World Record in mixed team along with Rishabh Yadav, finished with her standing on the podium in all three possible events she could medal in at the fourth stage of the 2025 Archery World Cup being held in Madrid. Earlier in the day, the supremely consistent women’s compound team won silver. Then Jyothi shot to silver in the women’s compound individual event, losing a super close final against Great Britain’s Ella Gibson 148-147.
The trio of Jyothi, Parneet Kaur and 16-year-old debutant Prithika Pradeep, who had topped the qualification round with a total of 2116 points, looked well on course for gold and justify their top-billing when they led 170-169 after the third end. However, they eventually went down 225-227 to Chinese Taipei, a 7 by Parneet in the fourth end proving very costly in the final equation.
In the mixed team event, Rishabh and Jyothi – who lost to eventual champions Netherlands in the semifinals – beat 10th-seeded El Salvador duo of Paola Corado and Douglas Vladimir Nolasco 156-153 to claim bronze. On Friday, they to 12th-seeded Netherlands 152-155. In the bronze playoff, the scores were tied 39-39 after the first end, but Jyothi and Rishabh pulled ahead by two points after the second and maintained their lead till the end to seal victory.
In the qualification round, Jyothi and Rishabh’s combined score of 1431 was the 144-arrow mixed team world record. Rishabh topped the men’s qualification charts with 716 while Jyothi did the same in the women’s section with a score of 715.
Rishabh, according to World Archery, led the men’s compound qualification round from start to finish at Vallehermoso Stadium and could have challenged the individual record too, currently held by Braden Gellenthien (718) but finished on 716, which is a new personal best and his highest score on the international circuit. Jyothi and Rishabh’s combined 1431 beat the previous mixed team world record of 1429, held by Denmark’s Tanja Gellenthien and Mathias Fullerton since the Krakow-Malopolska 2023 European Games. It is another encouraging early sign for India for LA 2028, with compound mixed team event added to the Olympic Games roster.
“It’s special because the [compound] mixed team is newly added to the Olympics, and we’ve been having such small achievements over time,” Rishabh, who also won mixed team gold with Jyothi at the season opener in Central Florida, had told World Archery. “We didn’t shoot mixed team together at the last two stages, but now we’re back – and we both shot well. It’s interesting and we’re happy with the consistency we have together.”
(With PTI inputs)
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