Turkish archer Gazoz advances to European Grand Prix final

After having broken the European record, Turkish archer Mete Gazoz has advanced to the final at the European Grand Prix, an international archery tournament in the Bulgarian capital Sofia. Gazoz beat his Italian rival Amedeo Tonelli 7-1 and will face Moldovan Dan Olaru in the final on Saturday. Gazoz had on Wednesday broken the European record by scoring 686 points in the 70-meter ranking round at the European Grand Prix. The previous mark of 685 points was set by Italy's David Pasqualucci at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

In the past six weeks, Gazoz has won the last stage of the 2018 Hyundai Archery World Cup in Berlin, Germany - qualifying for the season final in Samsun in the process - the Mediterranean Games in Tarragona and the European Youth Championships. His recent run of form has him up to number seven in the world rankings, according to worldarchery.org. Gazoz and Gülnaz Coşkun also increased the recurve junior mixed team world record that he and fellow Rio 2016 Olympian Yasemin Anagöz set in Berlin, from 1307 to 1333 points. Mixed team qualification records were introduced ahead of the Berlin stage of the 2018 Hyundai Archery World Cup. The Netherlands set the first compound mixed team ranking round record at 1410 out of 1440 points, while Korea set the first recurve mark at 1338.

Ukraine's Anastasia Pavlova and Markiyan Ivashko beat the latter in Sofia, scoring a combined 1343 points for the 72-arrow, 70-metre recurve qualification. The tournament in Sofia is the last on the continent before the European Archery Championships in Legnica, Poland at the end of August. Gazoz arrives at that championships as the defending silver medalist.