April 9, 1999

Greetings/Bonjour:

Approximately 400 people attended Jim Saito's funeral in Edmonton,from the City and the archery community. Jacquie is continuing her shooting and training, and will join her fellow competitors in Arizona next Thursday. Eleanor and Jake are busy in Edmonton. Our thoughts are with all of you./ Quatre-centimes de personnes ont ete presents a Edmonton pour le funerail de Jim Saito. Maintenant, Jacquie veut continuer d'entrainer, et elle va voyager en Arizona pour Le Cup AZ la semaine prochaine. Sa mere, Eleanor, et ton frere, Jake sont tres occupes a Edmonton.

1. Seminars/Les Seminaires

2. Interim Address for Dawn Groszko - l'Address active

3. Nationals Survey - Bruce Savage

4. Al Jensky, down south/Un reportage d'un de notre athlete

5. Mailmatches/Les Matches Postaux

6. FITA

7. Canada Cup

8. New e-mail Norm Baril

9. BC News/Nouvelles de C.-B.

10. MICA Results

11. Office Hours/Le Bureau d'Ottawa

1. Seminars/Les Seminaires

Universite de Moncton/University of Moncton

Investor's Group 1999 will be holding an Atlantic Coaches Seminar from May 21 to 24, 1999. Level 4 tasks available: Environment, Recovery, Planning/Periodization and Growth. Level 3 theory is available also. Contact the national Sport Centre, Atlantic Canada (902) 425-0942./

Investors Group 1999 presente un seminaire des entraineurs de l"Atlantique, du 21 au 24 mai 1999. Niveau 4: Les Facteurs Environmentaux, Recuperation, La Periodisation, et Croissance et la Maturite. Un cour de Theorie de Niveau 3 est aussi disponible.

Ministry of Students, Eductors, Learning Recource Industry is holding a conference in Vancouver, BC on April 25-27, 1999 called "Shared Solutions: Partners in Action. Call (250) 387-1171.

2. Interim Address for Dawn Groszko - l'Address active

While Dawn is waiting for her new house to be built, Albertans and Board members can reach her at/Depuis quelques mois, Dawn attends sa nouvelle maison. Maintenant, on peux lui ecrire:

10241 Tuscany Hills Way N.W.,

Calgary, AB T3L 2G4

Telephone: (403) 208-3783

3. Nationals Survey - Bruce Savage

Many of you have received the following information, but it was thought prudent to re-send it in the weekly Info.e-mail. A Canadian Nationals Format Survey has been developed, in English, by Bruce Savage. Please send your responses directly to him, not this office at:

To: FCA Exec. Directors or alternates, ACC, HPC

To: The Canadian Archery Community

Hello to all

I spoke out at the AGM in Winnipeg about the format of the Canadian Championships, and how I felt the format was not appropriate for a world ranking event. My position was that major FITA events are shot as half FITA's each day (usually 2 FITA's over 4 days) followed by a day of elimination matches.

As a reward (or probably a penalty) for raising the topic, I was asked to chair a committee to make recommendations to the FCA regarding the Championship Format. I was slow to react to the request, but after some encouragement from the High Performance Committee, I took up the challenge in February. For the last month, I have been the co ordinate of an email discussion directed to the Provincial Directors, ACC, HPC and a few concerned individuals that
became aware of the discussion.

Below is a summary (hopefully without bias) from the various provinces. I would ask you to respond to the information in the form of specific recommendation that you would like the FCA to consider.

The more specific you can make it the easier it will be to respond to.

Please copy your responses to

Al Wills - Pres

Alain Gravel - VP HPC

Denis Mrokwia - VP ACC

Jude Hooey - VP

These recommendations will be considered for the 2000 Championship.

Planning for the 1999 event in Edmonton is too far along to make changes for this year.

Thanks - please let you voice be heard - it is YOUR Championships

Bruce Savage savage@gbd.com

Nova Scotia - Eric Mott is reporting that Nova Scotia would prefer to see the Nationals in August, that it is a Domestic event that does not attract international archers. Flexibility is needed. The format should reflect the wishes of the Canadian Archery community.

Newfoundland - Andrew Webber reports that Newfoundland likes the field format as it is, the double FITA over 2 days is a good measure of a Champion and that the elimination round must stay. The combining of the 3 disciplines at the same time is desirable, and that August is the preferred timing

Alberta - Dawn Groszko reports that having the 3 disciplines of archery together at one event is a popular format in Alberta. It allows each discipline to show case their skills, allows travel to only one location each year and permits a greater social environment for all archers. The ranking World Ranking events should be held as a separate event and not be part of the Canadian Championship. Dawn also suggests that a Grand Canadian Champion concept could be used to reflect the uniquely Canadian nature of our Championships.

It is also suggested that to encourage more of the Excellence 2000 athletes to attend the Canadians, that participation could become a prerequisite for gold squad. Exceptions would have to be given to archers competing at World or Olympic events that conflicted with the Nationals.

Alberta supports the concept that the Championship should be an open event to all levels of Canadian archers.

Saskatchewan - Janice Boucher reports from Saskatchewan that having the 3 disciplines of archery together in one place at the same time is received positively in Saskatchewan. Janice also agrees with the comments made by Jude Hooey (Alberta).

Comments from Jude - Jude commented that having the Canadians as a World Ranking event only attracted 3 or 4 international competitors. In 1997 the entire Argentinean team showed up and it was not a World ranking event Jude agrees with Andrew Webber that shooting the entire FITA in one day is a better test of a Champion Jude has made the observation that fewer clubs are bidding to hold the Championships.

Manitoba - Tom Paukovic reports that he is pleased to see the 3D, Field and target together at one event and that the timing of the event should not conflict with events that force our top archers to sacrifice their our Championship.

British Columbia -From Lilian Meehan ".....Another item that has come to light this year is the format shot at the Canadians this year. If the format should remain the same, would the BCAA not produce a letter of suggestion that the shooting be Monday and Tuesday, Wednesday a day off, shoot Thursday and Friday with the shoot off on Saturday. It is not necessary to have athletes shoot four days solid and then go into a shoot down competition. I suggest going to Wednesdays off and then the athletes will be able to be ready for the next portion of the tournament. This year, Monday was a wasted day considering the schedule"

From Ron Ostermeier - "Our Nationals should have at least one 1200 round, one full FITA and one field round (24 targets) and these should be mandatory for awards. I would like to point out that anyone can attend this shoot, you don't have to make a team to be involved, and if it was fun to shoot you would have much better attendance

From Al Wills - "I just want to add one other important question to the discussions, I don't know why it hasn't come up yet, but it has been a point of discussion every time we discuss the format of the Nationals. DIVISIONS: As anyone who has been to a Nationals knows the number of awards is forbidding, the amount of time to award them diminishes the awards to all but those receiving.

So my question is: Do we have too many??

Quebec - .Marthe Cusson has reported the following comments from the athletes she has talked to. The Excellence 2000 athletes would like to see 2 FITA's shot over 4 days plus finals. ": You would also note that many athletes have express the wishes to have two (completely) separate events, that is have a Target Championship, and a Field Championship.
Regarding the timing of the Nationals, Marthe reports the following: "FCA should be able to decide when our National should be held, not the organizing committee
Ontario - I am wearing more than one hat in this situation. I volunteered to chair a committee to review the format and timing of the Nationals. I am also the Provincial Director for Ontario. The following are comments that I am reporting from archers in the province.

The major concern of Ontario archers that attend the Nationals, is that the Target Format is not consistent with over major international events. The Ontario target archers would prefer a 2 FITA over 4 days plus an elimination - similar to the Quebec request. This is not to say that all archers should be forced to shoot an international format, it is a request that the format be altered to allow greater choice.(I.e. Caledon 1995 and Victoria)

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The opportunity to take part in all disciplines of archery at a single event is supported in Ontario, and the need to have an opportunity to socialize with archers across the country is also supported in Ontario.

Sean McKenty - Past Pres of the OAA comments that the FCA should follow the OAA and split the Target Championship from the Field and 3D championships. The Target event should be held in a public location in an urban area to promote the sport.

Shawn Riggs- an Excellence archer from Ontario (currently ranked #1 male Olympic - congrats. Shawn) makes the observation that national sport funding is based on Olympic style archery. The elite shooters are often put in a position of having to choose to shoot at their ownNationals or attend other shoots that offer greater opportunities - ie a preferred format and more competition. This year the Nationals have been placed in the same week as the World Championships

Kathy Millar - FCA office Manager recognizes the pros and cons of having the Championships as either a "domestic" event or an "elite" event. She summed up her analysis this way "In a perfect world we could have rounds for the elite and rounds for the general archery membership running concurrently. This would be a sort of Archery Festival I guess. It would be great to link it up with a national coaches school and judges clinics and wheelchair clinics, etc. But, as I said this the ideal situation

______

Now it is your turn!!!!! Reflect on the previous comments and consider the following questions. Please email your thoughts - we need you input

___________

1) Disciplines of Archery to be included in the National Tournament(s)

THIS I THINK IS THE PIVOTAL QUESTION - The comments on this issue cover the complete spectrum. Where do you stand?

a) All 3 aspect of archery (target, field , 3D) should be combined to name a Grand Canadian Champion

b) Target and field should be combined at the same event. 3D run as a separate event but at the same time - STATUS QUO

c) All 3 disciplines should be separated and let each discipline survive or fail on their own merits

2) Nature of the event

What philosophy do you prefer?

a) a one domestic Tournament that shoots a lot of arrows

b) an Elite Tournament that reflects international standards of the discipline

2) The timing of the event:

a) What month would you prefer? August was mentioned the most

b)Who should control the dates for the Tournament?

i)organizing committee alone to set dates

ii) FCA to control timing

c) how do you avoid conflicts with other major shoots?

3) Other issues

a) would it be better to reduce the number of divisions?

compound fingers

compound release

recurve

barebow

b) how can clubs be encouraged to bid to hold the Nationals?

Club Executives:

a) would you bid if the disciplines were separated?

b) which would you bit for?

c) what is stopping you from bidding now?

i) too complex - don't have the facilities for all disciplines?

ii) can't make a profit?

iii) too much politics!

I believe we are at a cross roads in Canada concerning our National Championship.

We need to commit to either a family oriented, uniquely "Canadian Domestic Tournament ( Festival)" event. The challenge will be to promote the event to more recreational shooter so that the numbers at the event become large enough to make it economically viable for clubs to host.

Promote the events, as other sports do, and have the term "Canadian Champion" reflect an accomplishment at an event that meets international standards. The challenge here is to promote the events so that they becomes part of an International Circuit.

Thanks for reading this rather long summary. Please respond to any or all of the questions or comments, and copy your suggestion to myself and the 4 FCA Exec members listed at the first of this message.

Thanks in Advance Bruce Savage

4. Al Jensky, down south/Un reportage d'un de notre athletes

You may or may not have heard that the Canadian men's Olympic Team did quite well at the Golden Targets Tournament (Pan Am Games continental qualifier) in Havana, Cuba the week of March 14th. The team consisted of Gary Gillies as Team Leader, Shawn Riggs, Dave Dalziel, and myself. I didn't shoot all that well in the FITA ranking round, and ended up 35th out of 47. Since they cut at 32, I sat out the individual elimination's. Dave Dalziel and Shawn Riggs did shoot the elimination's.

Shawn had some difficulty, and ended up in 32nd place, but Dave shot very well, and ended up 5th. Also, in the ranking round, Dave won the bronze medal at 90m with a 296 (I think).

In the team round, we were ranked 6th out of 10 teams. Our first match was against the U.S., but we were up for the challenge. We ended up beating them by 11 points (227 to 216), which was quite the upset as they were a favourite to win the team event. We then beat Brazil in the semi-final match by 13 points (223 to 210). Unfortunately, we lost to Argentina in the final, only by three points (214 to 211). We were pleased to win the silver for Canada. The conditions were difficult as it was very windy all week. All the scores in the ranking round were relatively low (1276 was the highest FITA). It was quite a learning experience for me as it was my first international tournament other than the U.S. Nationals. I certainly had no expectations of coming home with a medal. It was very exciting. I just thought it might be worth letting others know in your next weekly update.

Again, please contact Joan or Gary for more details. Thanks.

Allen S. Jenskey Sr. Engineering Analyst (519) 637-4035

5. Mailmatches/Les Matches Postaux

The end of the indoor season approaches and our busy coordinator, Andrew Webber has some interesting statistics to share. / Notre saison de tir est presque fini et notre coordinateur, Andrew Weber, nous donne quelques details interessants.

Enclosed are some statistics and some inferences that I made from those figures.

Total Number of Competitors 136

Total Number of Clubs 18

Total Number of Provinces 8(Only Manitoba and NWT not represented)

Total Number of Males 101(74%)

Total Number of Females 35(26%)

Compounds 92(68%)

Recurve and Barebow 44(32%)

Recurve Female 14(32%)

Recurve Compound 21(18%)

Youths 30(22%)

Youth Compound 17(57%)

Youth Recurve 13(43%)

Youth Female 8(27%)

Youth Female Compound 2(12%)

While these statistics may not representative of Archery in Canada they do show some trends and some of those trends seem to be disturbing. The fact that compounds dominate is a fact of nature and probably represents our bowhunting background in the sport. What is disturbing is that there are fewer female compound shooters, percentage wise, than recurve female shooters. I think that this is a result of the clubs being dominated by male bowhunters which I think make a lot of the females uncomfortable. I know my wife and a number of women who have been involved in the sport in our province have expressed this opinion. The numbers for the youth compound shooters are even worse. Only two female compound shooters participated in the mail match. The numbers in the recurve pretty well parallels the adult percentages.

You may take these figures with a grain of salt and make of them what you will. I think the participation figures are fairly indicative of what is going on accross Canada and maybe we should take some effort to improve participation in certain areas.

Andrew

(Thanks, Andrew! A great job done as usual./ Merci pour ton effort!)

6. FITA

Press Release/Communiqué de Presse

Doping Control at the Vth World Indoor Target Archery Championships

We refer to the above mentioned Championship and we inform you of the following :

During this event, doping tests were carried out according to FITA rules. The IOC accredited Laboratory that performed the analysis reports that all the samples were tested negative.

Contrôle antidopage lors des Vèmes Championnats du Monde de Tir à l'Arc sur Cibles en Salle

Nous nous référons au Championnat susmentionné et vous informons de ce qui suit :

Lors de cette manifestation, des tests antidopages ont été effectués selon les règles de la FITA. Le laboratoire accrédité par le CIO qui était chargé d'analyser les tests annonce que tous ont révélé des résultats négatifs.

Sandrine Blatter, FITA Press Officer / Attachée de Presse FITA

Lausanne, 8 April 1999, 8 avril 1999

7. Canada Cup

The organisers of this year's Canada Cup warn that due to the limited field size, only the first 80 registered shooters will be accommodated, so register early./ Il y a moins que 80 positions disponsible cette annee. Si vous voulez le tirer, inscrivez-vous tout de suite.

8. New E-mail Norm Baril

Hey everyone, Just to let you know my new email address as of today. baril@home.com

Thank you / Bonjour tout le monde

Un mot ou deux pour vous laisser savoir mon nouvel addressede courier electronique: baril@home.com

Merci

9. BC News/Nouvelles de C.-B.

I have been doing some dealings here on the coast and as Al Wills has been involved I think everything is on the up and up. Our field has been dug up and we have transferred the FITA Stars from Parksville to Victoria on the 10 and 11th of April. All the clubs locally have been phoned to tell them it is changed, but this should be changed in your records. It is too late to put it out in your newsletter.

We are part of a Fish & Game Association and the Shotgunners decided to put in flush toilets and a septic field. That is all well and good but the drain field is between our 60 and 90 meter lines. This will take a while to get right again.

We moved it to Victoria because most of the archers shooting it were preparing for the Arizona Cup and they are all in Victoria and on Saltspring. I don't think we will be holding a FITA Star for a year or so as that group of archers in our club have all graduated from highschool or moved away. We have some great new archers coming along and will probably run some 900s for them to stretch them this year and then we will just see for 2000

Cheers for now Mike Miller

10. MICA Results/Resultats panamericains

Pascal nous a informe, cette annee il y a 47 site internationaux de la championnats en salle de COPANARCO. Il attend quelques resultats des Etats Unis, de Colombie, et de la Cuba./ Pascal Colmaire coordinates the sites and results for the COPANARCO INDOORS CHAMPIONSHIPS (MICA) and he is still waiting for results. As soon as he receives results from Cuba, Colombia and the U.S., he'll be able to publish them on our web page.

11. Office Hours/Le Bureau d'Ottawa

For the rest of April the office is open Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 8:30 am to 4:00 pm EDT. / Notre bureau sera overt chaque lundi, mecredi et vendredi ce mois, de 8H30 a 16H Heure de l'Est.

A bientot/See you. Kathy Millar FCA General Manager