The UK Indoor National Championships are taking place this weekend in Telford. It is the largest, and most prestigious indoor event in the UK archery calendar. News after the opening day is that local junior archers Aalin George, and her sister Kirsten have done the Island proud. Aalin placed first in the u16 Girls Compound class, and her score also placed her first in the overall junior championship, making her Junior National Indoor Champion. Aalin is currently Junior National Outdoor Champion as well. Younger sister Kirsten shooting in the same age group finished third U16, and forth overall. No mean achievement considering her age. In addition it has been announced by Archery GB (the sport’s governing body in UK) that Aalin is Junior Archer of the Year for 2011, a title that she was also awarded last year. On Sunday the Senior Indoor National Archery Championships were held at Telford and the Island was represented by three of our female compound archers. The George sisters, Aalin and Kirsten competed in the Senior ranks following on from their success in the Junior Championships on Saturday. They qualified in 11th and 17th places respectively and went through to the Head to Head knockout stages. Kirsten unfortunately went out in the 1/16th round (although this is an amazing achievement for a 14 year old). Aalin however progressed through the rounds only to go out on a single arrow shoot-off in the quarter-final stage to Andrea Gales who is one of the top compound archers in the UK. Our third archer competing in the Championships was Sarah Rigby. Sarah has only recently returned to full-time competition following her recovery from a shoulder injury incurred at the Island Games in July. She had a lot to live up to because she took the bronze medal at this competition last year. Sarah had a lower than usual qualification round and was only seeded 20th going into the Head to Head rounds. However she stepped up a gear and progressed through the 1/8ths round where she won her match with a one-arrow shoot off. She then won her quarter-final match with ease scoring 6-2 over her opponent. This put her into the semi-finals where she came up against one of the UK’s top compound archers and former World Champion, Nicola Simpson. Sarah came from behind to level this match but eventually won through again with a one-arrow shoot off, putting in a 10 against her opponents 9. She went into the National final against Naomi Jones and fought hard under enormous pressure, but unfortunately just lost out to Naomi in the fourth set. So she comes home with the Silver Medal, one better than last year but yet again puts the Manx archers in the forefront of archery in the UK. Congratulations from all members of the Isle of Man Archery Club to all three girls. Back at home it was a free choose week for all archers most plumbing for the Portsmouth round to put a qualifying score in to be considered for the Orrell shoot in Wigan at the end of January this brought personal bests from Rob Lott and farther and sons crew of Dave, Ethan and Rhys Moore also this week saw Tony Hartley debut his new Mongol bow and manages to make the entire hall have a laugh and put in a fantastic personal best. And as for the four archers that should have been at the nationals they decided to shoot a fita 18 the same round they would of shot at the nationals but with all their minds in other places there wasn’t any personal best from them this week. Portsmouth Free round Recurve Jon Rutland 60 15 517 Ethan Moore 60 10 516 PB Dave Moore 60 11 504 PB Rhys Moore 60 4 442 PB Adrian Breed 60 4 441 Rob Lott 59 6 424 PB Karen Lott 59 2 383 Portsmouth Free Barebow Tony Hartley 53 1 268 PB Fita 18 free round Peter Mumford 60 25 558 Colin Moore 60 10 535 Anne Rutland 57 14 490 Dave Berry 57 6 474 Next Shoots are Monday night Worcester Handicap league shooting time is 7pm for 7:30pm start and there will be a Worcester Scratch League match next Sunday 10am for 10:30 start. ENDS