Mumbai: Chikitha Taniparthi and Sahil Jadhav clinched India’s second gold in archery by winning the mixed compound event at the ongoing 2026 Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan, on Wednesday.
This was not the first time a mixed compound archery team from India had won a gold medal at the Asiad. But what Chikitha and Sahil achieved in addition to winning gold was earn direct passage to where no compound archer had ever been before — the Olympic Games. Yes.
The mixed team final at Aichi-Nagoya had, in fact, gone into a shootoff, while the Indian men’s team won gold against China in the final by a single point (238-237). Compound archery was first added to the World Championship roster in 1995, and is treated as an equal to recurve archery at the Archery World Cup since the inaugural edition in 2006. If both archers score the same points in an end, the set points are split 1-1. If both archers are tied on 4 set points each after four ends, the match goes into tiebreaker and a single arrow closer to the centre decides the match. In compound, the difference in cumulative points collected after each archer shoots 15 arrows decides a match. If scores are tied after 15 arrows, a single arrow closer to the centre decides the match.
After shooting three arrows, which is called an end, the points are counted and the archer who has more points is awarded the set. A set fetches 2 points. The archer who gets to 6 set points after four ends wins the match.
Recurve archery will have five events, as usual, at the LA Games — the men’s and women’s individual and team events along with a mixed event. Meanwhile, compound archery will have only the mixed team event.
