There were three reasons for Braintree Bowmen to celebrate at the Bedford County Archery Association and Southern Counties Archery Association Metric and Double Metric Championships.

Sydney Strugnell, Imogen Newby and Richard Burgess all claimed gold medals in their respective competitions on a successful weekend for the club.

Burgess had mixed fortunes in the Gents WA1440 Barebow.

Despite tackling the opening 90 metre distance well in gusting wind, he struggled at 70m and 50m, but still ended the day out in front to add a third gold to the ones claimed by the two Bowmen juniors.

Strugnell was in the Single WA1440 Metric V and Newby was going for the Double WA1440 Metric V.

The wind hampered Strugnell at the start, but she soon found her aim and, under the watchful eye of the Essex team captain, only missed out on a personal best (PB) by ten points as she started the gold rush with a score of 1,282. Newby was in for a long weekend in the Double competition and had the national Ladies’ Under-12 Double Metric V record of 2,573 points in her sights. She ended the opening day with 1,335, which was just short of her own PB and a great performance in the windier conditions of Sunday scored an impressive 1,366.

That set a new club, county and personal best and gave her a new national record claim as well as completing Braintree Bowmen’s medal haul.