Archery just closed out one of its busiest autumns in years. The Asian Games wrapped up in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan, in the first week of October with India posting its best archery haul in Games history, while the World Archery season proper came to a close weeks earlier in Saltillo, Mexico, where India's Dhiraj Bommadevara claimed a first individual recurve World Cup Final title. Add in a governance shift on Russian participation and some notable movement in the compound equipment market, and it's been a month worth catching up on.

India Matches Its Record Medal Haul in Aichi-Nagoya

Archery at the 2026 Asian Games ran from late September through October 3 at Okazaki Central Park, and Indian archers walked away with nine medals across the ten events on offer — five gold, two silver, and two bronze — matching the country's best-ever archery showing at the Games.

Gold medal board

  • Men's team compound — India beat China 238–237 in the final, with Sahil Jadhav hitting a perfect string of 10s.
  • Women's team compound — India beat China 238–234, matching the world-record score set by South Korea.
  • Mixed team compound — Sahil Jadhav and Chikitha Taniparthi won a shoot-off against South Korea — and banked a 2028 Olympic quota spot in the process.
  • Women's individual recurve — 17-year-old Kumkum Mohod beat Korea's Oh Ye-jin in a shoot-off after the final finished tied 5–5, becoming the first Indian to win individual recurve gold at the Asian Games.
  • Men's individual compound — South Korea's Kim Jong-ho beat Chang Cheng-wei of Chinese Taipei 149–145, the host federation's first gold of this archery competition.

Korea still owns the recurve side of the draw: Lee Woo-seok beat Japan's Junya Nakanishi 6–2 for his second individual gold of the Games, and the Korean men's team — Lee, Kim Je-deok, and Kim Woo-jin — closed out the team recurve final against India 5–1.

A 17-year-old breaking a Korean stranglehold on women's recurve, and a compound mixed team banking an Olympic berth in a shoot-off — this was not a quiet Games for Indian archery.

Bommadevara Breaks Through in Saltillo

Two weeks before the Asian Games, the 2026 Hyundai Archery World Cup season wrapped at its Final stage in Saltillo, Mexico. Dhiraj Bommadevara won India's first individual men's recurve title at a World Cup Final, beating Japan's Junya Nakanishi in a shoot-off for the gold. In the bronze match, Türkiye's Mete Gazoz shut out France's Jean-Charles Valladont 6–0.

It capped a strong season for India across the World Cup circuit — seven medals, including four golds, over the four regular stages plus the Final — and for Sahil Jadhav, who added a compound bronze in Saltillo on top of his Asian Games golds.

Restrictions on Russian Archers Lifted

Away from the field, World Archery's August newsletter confirmed the federation has lifted its restrictions on Russian athletes, teams, and officials, reopening a pathway back into international competition that had been closed since 2022. Expect the practical effects — entry lists, neutral-status conditions, qualification eligibility — to become clearer as the indoor season and early 2027 World Cup entries take shape.

Compound Bow Market Keeps Moving

On the equipment side, Lancaster Archery's trade blog has been flagging a genuinely active year for compound bows: a mid-October post introduced newcomer brand Beast Archery, while an earlier write-up argued this could be one of Bear Archery's strongest compound lineups in years. Combined with the compound-heavy medal tables out of Aichi-Nagoya, it's a reminder that the compound discipline — still outside the Olympic program but central to World Cup and Asian Games competition — continues to be where a lot of the sport's technical energy is going.

Looking Ahead

The calendar doesn't let up: a World Para Series stop in Santiago, Chile runs October 13–18, the Asian Para Games follow in Aichi-Nagoya later in the month, and a postponed Hyundai World Archery Para Series event in Dubai has been rescheduled for December 5–11. For Olympic-class archery, attention now turns to how qualification toward LA 2028 tightens up as the final quota spots from Asian Games and World Cup results get locked in.

Sources