Germany’s compound youth also enjoyed a strong day, with Simon Moritz and Ruven Flüß winning the under-18 and under-21 compound men’s titles, respectively.
Ruven scored a solid 146, the highest of the day, against Mexico’s Lot Máximo Méndez Ortiz, after edging through his semifinal against Wei Z Wu of Chinese Taipei in a shoot-off.
The German had fought his way up from 30th place in qualification.
“It’s unbelievable,” said an emotional Flüß afterwards. “It’s everything I dreamed of, my whole life. Thank you to everyone.”
Unable to attend the Gwangju 2025 World Archery Championships due to university commitments, he added: “I hope it’s not my last world championship.”
Moritz beat Hector McNeilly of New Zealand in the under-18 final, giving that country its best-ever result in this competition and its first youth worlds medal since Stephen Clifton took bronze in 2004.
McNeilly, a veteran of the Limerick 2023 World Archery Youth Championships, shot a miss in another windy final, but was accepting about the result.
“It’s adapt or die really, but yeah, the conditions are there, so you’ve got to really use them to your advantage,” he said. “It’s what happened – I’ll be able to live with it.”
“For New Zealand, I think it’s something special for sure. Archery is even smaller than everything else, so being able to compete and get on the podium is always something that is a great achievement.”
The competition continues with mixed team and individual recurve finals on Sunday.
You can watch finals coverage from Winnipeg with a subscription to archery+.
