June 23 - Archery club Grebengradski streličari held their traditional competition called Knight of Grebengrad on June 20. What caution did they take in terms of COVID-19?
In the last few days, there has been a story about the Adria Tour in Zadar, where Bulgarian tennis player Grigor Dimitrov, who played one match in the Zadar tournament, tested positive for the coronavirus. Others infected are Borna Ćorić, the fitness coach of the infected Dimitrov, and two more tennis players. The real number won't be released to the public since some do not want to test for COVID-19.
In the small city Novi Marof, in northern Croatia, archery club Grebengradski streličari had the honor of organizing the very first competition after getting a green light from Headquarters and Croatian Archery Association. It's been four months since the last archery competition, which was indoor, back then.
The competition was held outdoor, and there were 75 archers from mostly continental Croatia. High risk, but pre-caution was even higher.
At the entrance, one man measured the temperature with a non-contact thermometer of each person who entered this big field.
The temperature of each person was written down, so all could be transparent.
Each person received a hand sanitizer and cotton pad, so they could disinfect their hands after pulling out the arrows from the target.
Targets were at an even bigger distance apart than usual, so there was enough room for everyone to feel safe.
In the presence of the President of the Croatian Archery Association Darko Uidl, the tournament was opened by the Mayor of Novi Marof Siniša Jenkač. "I am delighted that our Grebengrad archers are among the most exemplary clubs for organizing archery tournaments in Croatia," he said. "I wish everyone a lot of sports success, and I urge the competitors to stay responsible throughout the tournament."
Grebengradski streličari showed great effort in organizing a tournament in the time of COVID-19, but also in their results. In the style of a recurve bow in the senior competition, Lovro Černi won 4th. In the cadet competition, Adam Gradišćak took the second place, Tin Krizmanić third, and Emanuel Ipša fourth. Among the seniors, Davor Pejnović Đora took 3rd place in the longbow category. Leo Žugec, Patrik Štefan, and Ivan Černi also performed for the Grebengrad archers.
In the second part of the competition, which had a show character, four first-place competitors in the absolute category, in styles, competed for the title "Knight of Grebengrad". Matija Šmaguc (boys up to 12 years of age, recurve bow) and Amanda Mlinarić (seniors, compound bow) competed in the tense final. Amanda was one centimeter closer to the center and took the victory.
