Antalya, Apr 18 (PTI) Star Indian woman compound archer Jyothi Surekha Vennam matched the record qualifying score of 713 points to top the leaderboard in the season-opening World Cup Stage 1 here on Tuesday.

Powered by Jyothi’s joint world record score, the Indian women’s team grabbed the top seedings ahead of Mexico, as the two sides got a first-round bye and will open their campaign in the quarters.

The 2021 World Championship silver medallist landed the arrow on target an incredible 66 times out of 72 shots to match Sara Lopez’s world record score that she had achieved during the 2015 Colombian National selections.

Having totalled 353 in the first six rounds, the Telengana archer was bang on target especially in the back end as she shot 360 out of 360 en route to smashing a six-year-old Asian record.

Korean archer So Chaewon held the previous Asian record qualifying score in the compound women section with her score of 709 shot at the 2017 Asian Championship in Dhaka.

“I never expected it, because my personal best in a competition was 710. And this is my best score,” Jyothi said.

“Actually, I shot a liner arrow in the last end and I wasn’t sure, but behind me the Great Britain’s coach told me, ‘No, it’s a ten and you shot great’.

“It does feel great (to be the top seed) and I’m pretty happy with my shooting. Until the last arrow I was just focused on my process.” “For now, I want to focus on my shooting, so I can maintain my scores and everything.” World number three Sara was three points adrift of Jyothi and finished third in the leaderboard.

Making her World Cup debut, Aditi Swami shot 700 to be ranked 15th, while Avneet Kaur (699) completed the Indian team performance with a 19th place finish in the qualifying round.

In the absence of multiple World Cup gold medallist Abhishek Verma, who could not qualify, the compound men archers struggled.

Twenty-year-old debutant Ojas Deotale was the best among the Indians, securing a 17th place finish with 709 points.

Three points shy of Ojas, veteran Rajat Chauhan and Prathamesh Jawkar were the next best Indians at 29th and 30th spots respectively.

Debutant Rishabh Yadav (704) could not make the three-member Indian team, finishing at 38th place and he will fight only in the individual category.

The Indian compound team bagged the sixth place with 2121 points and were seeded straight to pre-quarters where they will face 11th seeded Chinese Taipei.

The recurve qualifying round will commence on Wednesday.

Source: PTI News