Tears of joy were shed once again by Andres Temiño Mediel as he defeated Marcus D’Almeida via shoot-off to become the recurve men world champion at the Gwangju 2025 Hyundai World Archery Championships.
It looked as if at one point Mediel might’ve won the match outright 6-4 but with his first arrow of the fifth set appearing to be a liner, target judge Qu Yinan downgraded it from possible 10 to nine, making it 28 apiece that end and 5-5 in set points.
The 21 year old however still had another 10 in him, dropping his eighth one when it counted most in the shoot-off, just to the right of the spider whilst D’Almeida squandered, putting his final arrow of the competition in the nine-ring. The beaming bright light from the sun on the target causing vision issues for many arrows today.
“Even more excited than yesterday, very happy with what we’ve achieved and now it’s time to enjoy it,” he emotionally said on his second gold at Gwangju after the mixed team success yesterday. “I didn’t do anything different than usual. I continued doing what I’ve been doing throughout the competition, especially being present at every moment so as not to get caught up in what could happen, and it happened.”
It’s been almost the perfect week for second seed Mediel.
At just 21 year old, in his second World Championships, he has brought never-seen milestones before to his beloved country in the space of 48 hours as well as setting his new personal best to 692 in qualifications.
Before yesterday, Spain had no gold medals to show for Worlds and before today? Not one individual World champion, quite astonishing considering it being one of the biggest countries in Europe that has hosted major archery competitions such as the Barcelona 1992 Olympic Games, the Madrid 2005 World Archery Championships, the Madrid 2019 World Archery Youth Championships and most recently stage four of the World Cup – also in Madrid.
The 48 million people of Spain have Shanghai 2024 World Cup gold medallist Mediel to thank for both, especially pulling through such tough matches in the searing heat of the afternoon session at 5.18 Democracy Square.
All three of Mediel’s matches before the meet against D’Almeida ended in 6-4 scrapes, starting with Chinese Taipei’s Su Yu-Yang in the 1/8 round, Mexican Madrid winner Matias Grande in the quarters and then eventual bronze medallist of the day Kim Je Deok in the semi-finals.
