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by Gary Yamaguchi
Perspective from a Judge's point of view:
When the call came out to volunteer for judging
duty, I accepted as a test of my children’s independence.
Both of my children who compete in target archery appear to
have matured enough to take care of themselves, and rather
than hover over them I decided to see how well it would work.
The first day I was assigned to watch the
practice line on the adult field, and to inspect recurve
equipment. Pretty normal inspections, except for the fact
that the equipment being inspected belonged to the top archers
in the US. Top archers, yes, and all were very nice, normal
people. A few odd pieces warranted a check on the rules –
were vibration dampeners allowed on limbs of barebows? (No…)
Was an optical fiber allowed on a clicker? (Yes.) Was it OK
for a nail on the bottom of a sight bar (a Clout sight) to
coexist with an open (FITA) aperture? (Not at the same time.)
When we learned that the youth field had only
two judges, I was sent to assist there. One of the judges had
a potential conflict with athletes he was coaching, and I had
conflicts with my two kids – so National Judge Jane Johnson
was kept pretty busy making calls on the bales for which the
conflicts existed. I learned some things from Judge Jane.
During a triangular argument over the placement of a scope on
the field, which had my head spinning in three different
directions (archer 1, archer 2, coach), she came over, asked,
“So, what’s the problem here?” Then she calmly reached over,
grabbed the scope, removed it from the line, and then stated
that they could sort it out afterwards. Done deal. She also
relayed her view of being a judge, saying (paraphrased), “Our
role is to protect these archers’ scores…” I’d never quite
understood it like that. It gave me an entirely new
perspective!
Other interesting dilemmas: Double pass-throughs
on the first shots of the 4th day – thankfully both
shots were good ones (X and 9) and replace the bale. Archers
trading individual targets at the 30 m distance and not
telling anyone until after they shot their first end.
Team rounds for Male Compound and Female
Recurve senior divisions were held on the youth field
Thursday, August 6 following the cessation of the day’s youth
half-FITA. Male Recurve and Female Compound team competitions
were held the following day. Any three archers, including
Cadet archers, could enter as a team, but only those shooting
the Junior and Senior FITA rounds were given seeded
positions. The International divisions featured matches
between the Taiwan and the US teams, with the US teams winning
both the men’s and women’s medals.
Judging the team rounds was fast and furious,
with far too much action going on to watch every athlete’s
change-over, foot position, and arrow extraction. Patterns
soon emerged, however, and yellow cards were shown, usually on
the second offense. Sometimes I noticed the first offense
while standing four teams away, and it would have been
impractical and distracting to have shown the yellow card
across the other teams. However, the archers were watched
again from a closer position during the next end, with my
yellow card at the ready. Only a few infractions were noted,
however, mainly from archers withdrawing their arrows before
crossing the shooting line, or having two team members
simultaneously having one or more feet on the ground in front
of the one-meter line.
All in all, serving as a field judge at a
national tournament was a fun and rewarding experience. Much
more fun than agonizing over my kids’ scores. Both kids shot
personal bests without my “help.” I expect it will be the
first of many national judging experiences for me! My only
regret – it’s tough to take photos (as well as ill-advised)
when you are watching the line. The reader will have to find
their photos taken by Beth Luman here:
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/m...0Ohio%20Day1/?
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/m...20Ohio%20Day2/
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/m...20Ohio%20Day3/
http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/m...Ohio%20Awards/
So how did the Arizona contingent do? Bowman
female recurve Karissa Yamaguchi shot her first 1300 (a
1322) and finished 2nd, while older brother
Nathan Yamaguchi (Cadet) also finished 2nd
despite posting a personal best at 30 m. Junior female
compound Mackenzie Kieborz won 3rd place
after the double FITA, and was 4th in the Olympic
Rounds competing against the combined Junior/Senior women’s
field! (Way to go Mackenzie!) She won a one-arrow shoot-off
in the ¼ finals, 9 to 7. Tony Don (now a Senior men’s
recurve) was 11th after the FITA, and 14th
in the combined Junior/Senior men’s OR.
Sun Devil Archery Coach Kari Jill Granville
won the Shenk award for the second straight year for the
female recurve archer with the best combined scores at the US
Indoor Nationals, National Field Championships, and US Target
Nationals. OTC Resident Archer Brady Ellison was named
the Shenk award recipient for the best all-around male recurve
archer.
The awards ceremony concluded with an
announcement that the 2010 US Target Nationals would be hosted
again by Butler County, Ohio.
Dual Olympic gold medalist Darrel Pace
then served as disk jockey for a dance.
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