Mike Schloesser and Andrea Becerra have seeded top of the men‘s and women‘s fields after compound qualification concluded this morning at the Chengdu 2025 World Games.
Schloesser, still looking for his first World Games title and after an up-and-down season during which he became a father for the first time, scored 715 with 43x.
In the expected very hot and humid conditions, the Dutchman edged out Denmark’s Mathias Fullerton on 714, with Austria’s Nico Wiener in third with 713
“I think I managed well and I’m really happy with it. And it just felt really good. The mistakes I made were really close to the line, so I’m really confident going into the next couple of days,” said Mike.
“The humidity is crazy here and… the temperature got you mentally as well. You needed to aim off sometimes and you needed to be very alert. But it’s for the same for everybody.”
Despite winning every major title available – some of them several times – this is Mike’s third attempt at an elusive World Games gold medal. Last time out, at Birmingham 2022, he was beaten by Abhishek Verma in the quarterfinals.
“Of course the World Games is kind of something that’s been eluding me but we’ll see. I’m shooting well and I’m having fun and we’ll see. I’m confident in it but there are a lot of good archers here,” said Mike.
Mexico’s Andrea Becerra would end up on top of the women’s list with 706 with 27x, just ahead of the USA’s Alexis Ruiz in second and Madhura Dhamangaonkar of India in third, both on 705.
“I’m really happy with how I managed today. Hopefully tomorrow and the day after will be just as good or hopefully better and I’m feeling really good. We want to be on the podium so we’re looking forward to that,” said Becerra, the individual champion at the World Cup in Central Florida this year.
“The weather has been really challenging, we‘re sweating all over; the face, the hands, everything becomes a little bit slippery. But we’re making the best of it, we feel prepared and no matter the weather we will still going to try our best,” she added.
