Archery at the 1908 Summer Olympics – Women's double National round

The women's double National round was one of three archery events in archery at the 1908 Summer Olympics. The competition was held on Friday, 17 July and Saturday, 18 July. One round was held each day. The weather made it hard to compete. There was a lot rain and wind on the first day and gusts of wind on the second day.Official Report, pp. 100–01.

Great Britain was the only nation to enter female archers.  This meant they won all the medals. Queenie Newall, at 53 years of age, set a record for oldest female Olympic gold medal winner. Lottie Dod took second place; her brother William Dod won the gold medal in the men's York round. Beatrice Hill-Lowe took bronze.

Countries were allowed 30 archers each.Official Report, p. 33. Twenty-five archers from Great Britain competed.

Background
This was the second and last time the Olympics had a double National round event for women; it was previously held in 1904.

Alice Legh won 23 national championships from 1886 to 1922, but she chose not to compete in the 1908 Olympics. Among the archers who did compete, Lottie Dod was the most accomplished sportswoman, though she was best known for playing tennis. Dod had retired from tennis in 1893 and had successful careers in field hockey and golf before turning to archery in the Olympics.

 Competition format 
The archers shot a total of 144 arrows each over the two rounds of 72. Each round consisted of 48 arrows at 60 yards (54.8 m) and 24 arrows at 50 yards (45.7 m). Three arrows were shot per end. Each hit was worth 9, 7, 5, 3, or 1 points depending on which ring was hit; an arrow touching two rings would count as hitting the higher value. Ties were broken first by number of hits, then by score at the longest range (60 yards), then by hits at the longest range.Official Report, pp. 413–14.

 Schedule 
The double National round event was held on the first two days of the archery schedule. The men's double Yorkround was also held on those days.

FFinal
 Event  17 July  18 July  19 July  20 JulyMen's double York round  F   Men's Continental style     FWomen's double National round  F   

Results
After the first day, the top two archers had a lot more points than everyone else. Dod and Newall had each hit 66 targets out of 72; Dod had a small lead of 348 to 338. Newall was the best archer on day two. She had the best round of the tournament with 350. Dod's second day was much worse, however, as she scored only 294 (the sixth-best score of the day). This gave Newall the gold medal. Dod finished in second place. Hill-Lowe scored 343 on the second day; this was much better than her 275 first-day score, and it was the second-best score behind Newall. This gave her the bronze medal for third place.

 Rank  Archer  Nation  Score  Hits      688  132      642  126      618  118 4     605  122 5     587  123 6     582  112 7     553  117 8     534  112 9     522  123 10     510  114 11     503  109 12     503  107 13     500  112 14     498  104 15     484  104 16     483  109 17     465  111 18     451  103 19     427  107 20     419  103 21     410  92 22     387  93 23     385  95 24     323  89 25 Hilda Williams    316  82

After the event
Newall was defeated by Legh by 151 points the next week at the British national championships. Newall would go on to win in 1911 and 1912.

Women's archery would not be held again at the Olympics until 1972. (Archery was not held in 1912, only men's events were held in 1920, and the sport was absent from the programme from 1924 to 1968.)

References

Sources
 Official Report of the Games of the IV Olympiad (1908).
 De Wael, Herman. Herman's Full Olympians: "Archery 1908".  Accessed 8 April 2006. Available electronically at  .

Category:Summer Olympics events by year