22-year-old Australian archer Laura Paeglis set to make Olympics debut

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A young Australian archer making her Olympic debut is not competing under conditions designed to mimic competition in Paris. The 22-year-old Laura Paeglis is doing all she can to prepare to shoot on target, on the worlds biggest archery stage.

Transcript

00:00Aiming for gold. Laura Paglis narrowly missed selection for the Tokyo Games three years

00:10ago but now her Olympic dreams are back on target. She's qualified for Paris.

00:16I was the best feeling in the world. It was the animated movie Brave that sparked

00:21her interest in archery. Brave was like the big one that I was just

00:25obsessed with. Her shooting went to a new level when her

00:30family moved to a bigger property. Paglis shoots up to 300 arrows a day at home with

00:36her dad as coach. Has it surprised you how committed your parents

00:40have become in supporting your archery? It does a bit actually. When I first started

00:46they thought it was a joke. Today is no joke. Paglis is taking part in

00:52a mock Olympic tournament. On the eve of the Paris Games the idea of

00:56today is to closely simulate Olympic competition and that means distractions including from

01:02the media and from the crowd. A couple things that can happen is the wind

01:09not picking up on it quickly, camera noises, media, even just the rhythm of the other shooter.

01:17Australia is a relative minnow in Olympic archery. Korea has dominated the sport winning

01:2227 golds since 1972. But Paglis isn't deterred by the competition.

01:28It's all about getting in there and doing the best I can and shooting every arrow like

01:34it's the most important thing.

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