As I have mentioned in a few of my previous posts, my hobby for the last 4 years is archery which is one of the most important factors that I considered when it was time to pick my future university. As I am doing it competitively, I needed to go somewhere that had an archery club nearby and a coach to train me. As I was going through all universities, I found out that none of them had an actual university team except for Surrey, and that’s one of the reasons why I chose it. To be honest because Surrey’s hospitality school was high in the world rankings, it was one of my top choices anyway but having an archery club would be very confident for me. And it is as the venues I am training are just 5 minutes from my flat in Surrey’s Sports Park, the university’s sports centre. I have training every twice a week with an extra third day for the everyone that has their own bow (membership includes shooting with one of the clubs’ bow, so you do not need to have your own).  The venue we’re training is spacious and allows a big line of targets and shooting slots. The club’s coach, Katya and the club’s president Afonso, are very keen to help as much as they can and try to develop the club constantly and consistently along with the other members of the committee.  During last semester we participated in many indoor competitions including the big annual indoor championship BUCS which took place last week in Bristol. It was nearly one of my best experiences I had since coming to the UK in September. The championship was scheduled for Saturday afternoon, however we left for Bristol at Friday in order to help with the setup of the field. During competition it was amazing to see all those archers together again after 2 years of the pandemic. Team Surrey had an extraordinary performance and 8 of our archers including me qualified successfully to the finals on the 19^th of March in the University of Warwick. After that the outdoor season begins meaning that we get to shoot in a distance of maximum 70+ meters. For outdoors we have another BUCS championship which will be held in Lilleshall on the 11^th of June.

I love archery because daily training makes me having goals and milestones. Team Surrey Archery offers me a wide range of opportunities to compete and thus it increases our motivation and passion about the sport. That’s all about my archery experience in Surrey! If you want to learn more about our club you are more than welcome to visit the club’s social media accounts (Instagram: @teamsurreyarchery , Facebook: Team Surrey Archery Club) or website: https://teamsurreyarchery.wixsite.com/uosarcheryclub