Sarah Martin and Alex Rousseau are what you might call straight shooters.
The two Lower Similkameen residents took gold for their archery skills at the recently held Canadian Indoor 3 -D Archery Nationals in Lethbridge, Alberta.
Osoyoos archer and instructor Brock Paton also took home a gold medal.
What’s even more remarkable is the fact that Martin is a relative newcomer to the sport - she began taking lessons last July after discovering the Osoyoos Traditional Archery School.
“I started shooting well,” said Martin, who caught the attention of coach Brock Paton.She was encouraged, and began entering long bow recurve tournaments, culminating in the big win at the Lethbridge Nationals April 18-20.
The trio took the men’s longbow, women’s longbow, and junior traditional categories at the event.
“It’s pretty exciting,” Rosseau said. The 17 year old plans to continue competitive archery, but also plans to start university in the fall and will take his competitive pursuits “one day at a time.”
“Education is my priority,” he said. Rousseau was a casual archer, who picked it up again recently after a two year absence from the sport.
Martin has been encouraged by her success in the sport, and is looking forward to future competitions. The B.C. Provincials come up in Duncan in June, the Outdoor Canadian Nationals take place in Lac la Biche in August, and the Alberta Provincials event happens in July.
“My goal is to qualify for Team Canada and represent the country at the Longbow Women’s World Competition,” said Martin, who said her original reason for taking up archery was to relax and unwind.
“It was initially a ‘zen’ thing,” Sarah laughed, “then as Alex and I started doing well, we got wired - on our way home from practise one afternoon we said to each other, ‘what are we doing?’ It became kind of masochistic.”
Locally, archery is mainly practised by hunters as opposed to those who indulge in the sport for competitive reasons. Bow hunting is a separate license involving a different time frame beyond the regular hunting season, so hunters with a bow license get an extended season. Archery lessons are available in Keremeos from time to time - interested persons should contact the Keremeos Cawston Sportsmen’s Association for more information at: www.k-csa.com
The Keremeos - Cawston Sportsmen’s Association is hosting an archery shoot on May 3-4 at the Pow-Wow grounds in the Ashnola.