CHARLOTTETOWN, PE – Starting tomorrow, the best archers from eleven provinces and territories will compete in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island for the 2023 Canada Winter Games. The Province of PEI hosted the most recent iteration of the Canadian Championship and for these Games, target archery moves indoors and will take centre stage at the Eastlink Centre. It has been 20 years since archery joined the program for the winter side of the Canada Games and the competition promises to be exciting. 

The athletes representing the provincial and territorial teams are a mix of new archers and veteran athletes with experience on the international stage. Some to watch include Dustin Watson, a compound archer from Ontario who was recently the World Champion in the U21 men’s compound division at the World Archery Field Championships last summer and was then named as World Archery Americas’ Compound U21 Male Athlete of the Year. Chyler Sanders of Manitoba, is a compound archer who won the bronze medal in the U21 women’s division at the 2022 Youth and Masters Pan Am Championships and attended both the 2019 and 2021 World Archery Youth Championships, representing Canada well on both occasions. 

A recurve archer to follow will be Sophia Elder (Northwest Territories), who has quite recently switched over to a recurve bow from barebow. She holds many Canadian records on the barebow side and will look to make a splash at these Games. Luke Smollett, also a recurve archer, who was the last team member to shoot an arrow during the Fred Usher Cup at the Canadian Championships last year, winning Alberta the cup, hopes to once again represent his province with distinction at these Games. 

Many of the athletes attending the Games have been to national or provincial events and will aim to bring home the gold medal for their respective home teams. 

The competition will include two qualification rounds on the 1st and 2nd of March, which will determine seedings for the individual and mixed team elimination rounds, to take place on the following two days.

To watch some of the events at the Games, click here: https://www.canadagames.ca/watch 

Event Schedule

• Wednesday, March 1
  • Morning: Compound Qualification Round 1
  • Afternoon: Recurve Qualification Round 1
• Thursday, March 2
  • Morning: Recurve Qualification Round 2
  • Afternoon: Compound Qualification Round 2
• Friday, March 3
  • Morning: Compound Individual Eliminations and Medal Matches
  • Afternoon: Recurve Individual Eliminations and Medal Matches
• Saturday, March 4
  • Morning: Compound Mixed Team Eliminations and Medal Matches
  • Afternoon: Recurve Mixed Team Eliminations and Medal Matches

For more information, please contact:

Zoe Meil, Communications & Safe Sport Coordinator

zmeil@archerycanada.ca

(613) 260-2113 ext. 3