Turkey has achieved a historic milestone by winning its first Olympic medal in archery at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. The Men’s Recurve Archery Team narrowly missed a spot in the finals against France but triumphed over the People’s Republic of China in the bronze medal match.
In their match against China, Turkey won the first set 55-54. After losing the second set 57-56, the score was tied at 2-2. The Turkish team then won the third set 55-54 and the fourth set 57-54, securing a 6-2 victory in sets and claiming the bronze medal. This victory also marked Turkey’s first medal at Paris 2024.
Technical Director of Turkey praised his athletes’ performance, emphasizing that three years of intense effort were behind this success. He said, “After Mete Gazoz’s gold medal, winning a medal at the Olympics has become more achievable for us. With proper preparation, we believed we could increase the number of medals. The athletes put in tremendous effort over the past three years.” He noted that while they lost to France by millimeters, they had a special motivation against China, which they used to change the athletes’ mentality and boost their motivation.
Olympic champion Mete Gazoz mentioned the challenging day they had, explaining how they evaluated each match step by step and ultimately made it to the podium. He recounted the tough conditions during training set by the technical team, saying, “We shot arrows with our pulse at 180. Today, it wasn’t even that high. We proved that this medal was won during training.”
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