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The goal of Archery is to shoot arrows accurately at a target marked with ten concentric rings, increasing in point value the smaller and closer to the centre they become. A hit in the centre ring scores ten points and scoring zones decrease in value until the outer ring, which is worth one point.

In general outdoor competitions, the target is placed at different distances ranging from 30 meters to 90 meters, however in Paralympic competition only a 70 meter distance is used. In indoor competitions, the distances are 18 meters and 25 meters. The size of the target also varies with the distance. At the longer distances, it has a diameter of 122cm while at the 18 meter distance it is only 40cm.

Archery competitions include both individual and team events. The format of the competition at World and Regional Championships is as described below.

Individual Competition

A qualification round occurs during the first two days of competition. For individual competition all competitors shoot 36 arrows at each of four distances shooting 144 arrows in total. The distances are dependent on the athlete's functional classification. ARW2 and Standing men shoot from distance of 90, 70, 50 and 30 meters, while women and ARW1 men shoot from 70, 60, 50 and 30 meters. For more information about the classes used for Archery, go to 'Classification'.

At the two longer distances each archer shoots a group of six arrows (known as an 'end') within four minutes at a 122cm wide target. At the short distances (50m and 30m), each archer shoots an end of three arrows in two minutes at an 80cm wide target. The top 64 men and women in each division of the qualification round proceed to the elimination rounds.

For the Elimination rounds, Archers are placed on an elimination-pairing chart according to their standing at the end of the qualification round. The only distance is 70m for both men and women. The archers shoot three ends of six arrows each (18 arrows in total) at a 122cm target, with four minutes to complete each end. The winner of each pairing proceeds to the next round. After the 1/32, 1/16 and 1/8 elimination rounds, the field is reduced to eight archers in each division.

The eight winning archers go on to the Final round. Each athlete shoots four ends of three arrows each (12 arrows in total) on a separate target. During final matches archers alternate their shots and each archer has up to 40 seconds to shoot one arrow. The competition continues through quarterfinals, semi-finals and the final for Gold and glory.

In Paralympic Games the same format is used except that the qualification round consists of 72 arrows and competitions use a 70-meter distance for all classes.

Team competition

The top 16 men's and women's teams in each division will be selected using the combined top three scores from the Individual Qualification Round. All members of a team must be of the same gender, same bow type and from the same country. However, teams may be made up of athletes from all three classes.

The target for team competition is 122cm at a distance of 70 meters for both men's and women's events. In team events, an end consists of nine arrows (or three per team member) and one match consists of 27 arrows or three ends. All three archers on a team will be required to finish shooting before the prescribed time limit (currently: three minutes). The archers may shoot in any sequence and may shoot one, two or three arrows each time they are on the shooting line but only one member of a team may be shooting at any one time. Again, competition continues through quarter, semi and final stages to decide the rankings.

(Credit: IPC. Click here for further information.)