Bahattin Hekimoğlu was part of a Turkish team that broke the W1 men's team world record on day one of the World Archery Para Championships in The Netherlands ©World Archery

The Turkish W1 men’s team broke the eighth world record of the World Archery Para Championships in the Dutch city of ‘s-Hertogenbosch today.

Turkey’s Bahattin Hekimoğlu and Liu Jing of China led the individual W1 men’s and women’s ranking rounds in an event that will qualify 12 archers in the division to next year's Paralympic Games in Tokyo. .

"I’m very happy to be the top man here," said Hekimoğlu.

"I have fought and worked hard for it, and I’ve been after qualifying and finishing in high positions since the Europeans in Pilsen last year."

Hekimoğlu finished 13 points ahead of China’s Zhang Tianxin, who had 657, while Zhang’s compatriot Li Ji finished with 655 for the 72-arrow 50-metre ranking round.

Hekimoğlu and Turkish teammates Naci Yenier and Yiğit Caner Aydin combined to break the W1 men’s team world record with a score of 1969 points.

"We really want to go to Tokyo, and this is all part of the efforts we are doing," Hekimoğlu added.

"That road looks closer now that we are here and this is just the beginning for what we expect to do throughout the week."

China’s Liu Jing and Italian para archer Asia Pellizzari both finished on 629 points at the top of the W1 women’s leaderboard - but Liu had 20 Xs to Asia’s 15.

Turkey’s Bahattin Hekimoğlu, centtre, topped the individual rankings and helped his nation break the W1 men’s team world record with a score of 1969 points at the World Archery Para Championships in The Netherlands today ©World Archery
Turkey’s Bahattin Hekimoğlu, centtre, topped the individual rankings and helped his nation break the W1 men’s team world record with a score of 1969 points at the World Archery Para Championships in The Netherlands today ©World Archery

There is no W1 women’s team event taking place in ’s-Hertogenbosch.

China, Italy and Russia qualified as the top three squads in the W1 mixed team event. 

Four of the eight mixed teams at these Championships will win quota places at Tokyo 2020.

The seventh world record of these Championships had been provided by the Russian compound women’s open team of Stepanida Artakhinova, Tatiana Andrieveskaia and Anastasia Dzhioeva.

The trio improved their own previous mark for team qualification with a combined score of 2037 out of a possible 2160 points.

Second- and third-ranked Great Britain and Italy were also above the previous world-best mark.

China’s Gao Fangia, Li Dandan and Wu Chunyan broke the recurve women’s open team qualification record by 32 points.

Iran claimed the recurve mixed team ranking round world record and China the compound mixed team record.

Yesterday, on the opening day of competition, three world records had been set in men’s competition through the United States compound men’s open team, Belgium’s visually impaired athlete Ruben Vanhollenbeke and Kim Min Su of South Korea in the individual recurve men’s event.