By Michael Lapointe
When Eric Peters’ flight lifts off for China and the Oct. 13-20 world youth archery championships, he’ll be traveling at around the same speed as one of the arrows he fires. “My arrows can move around 200 feet per second,” notes the 16-year-old from Ottawa, one of three athletes selected to represent Canada. “And at some of the higher levels among seniors you’re looking at anywhere from 220 to 250 feet per second with a recurve bow.”
Wanting to try “something different,” Peters got into the sport at age 11. “It was something I wanted to pick up and I just stuck with it,” explains the recurve bow athlete who competes in the lone archery Olympic discipline. “Now it’s a fairly major part of my life.”
The schedule can be demanding. Peters heads to a number of ranges in the area five days a week to stay sharp. Weather permitting, he often practices next to Baribeau arena in Gatineau. When he needs to train indoors, the 2012 Ottawa Sports Awards archery athlete-of-the-year takes the bus to the RA Centre range. Peters hits the gym on Tuesdays, as athletes in his event require large amounts of upper-body strength and endurance, plus a strong core.
“You’re looking to keep your drawing arm fairly strong and you have to keep yourself in balance, so you need a lot of overall strength waist up,” he explains, especially when “you start to move out to longer distances such as 60 and 70 metres.”
Peters’ goal in China is to earn a spot with Canada to go to the Youth Olympics next summer, so it’s no surprise he’s got aspirations to compete for his country at the Summer Olympics later this decade. “It’d be a stretch to get to the 2016 Olympics” as it would be his first year shooting top distances, signals Peters, but he feels he’s got a solid chance at making it to the 2020 Games in Tokyo.
Despite the pace at which his arrows travel, the speed to reach the top levels of archery is much slower. “It’s probably one of the hardest sports to get into,” says Peters, who represents the South Nation Archery Club, also where he gets his equipment, 40 minutes south of Ottawa. “It’s not easy to start with, it never becomes easy, and you need to stick with it for a long time before you start to see yourself progress.”