Texas A&M Archery will compete for their 24th National Championship title on Feb. 21–23 when they host the USA Archery Indoor Nationals at Texas A&M’s Physical Education Activity Program building on West Campus.
Two Aggie archers competed at the 2024 Olympic Games, and A&M has fielded five Olympians overall. Since its founding in 1980, A&M archery has held the USA Archery Indoor Nationals title for over half of its existence. The competition is open to the public and includes non-collegiate competitions. The A&M archers will shoot on Friday at 6 p.m. and Saturday at 8 a.m.
“With us not being a varsity sport, we don’t always get the publicity,” coach Lorinda Gomez said. “And we are obviously a highly competitive program for being a sports club. There are a lot of people who have competed at the world level. We have a top-level program considering we’re not one of the varsity sports.”
The Aggies reclaimed their championship in 2024 after a loss in 2021 ended an 11-year winning streak. Gomez said the team’s goal while hosting the National Tournament is to keep the title.
“We went through a two-year period where we had gotten second place in the ‘22 and ‘23 years, and so that kinda fed everybody, made them hungry and want to do really well,” Gomez said. “They’ve been working really hard and putting forth the effort and kind of feeding off the hype of winning last year.”
Coach Frank Thomas noted the club sport has produced two Olympic medalists in addition to multiple World Champion titles over the years. Casey Kaufhold, Class of ‘26, took a year off of school to compete and was the first Aggie to bring home hardware from the 2024 Olympic Games when she won bronze in mixed-team archery. She wasn’t the only Aggie at the Olympics — sociology junior Catalina GNoriega also competed in Paris.
Competing with top-level archers is a key advantage, explained business hospitality management sophomore SK Jentsch, who has been shooting barebow for two years at A&M.
“It’s a lot of fun to practice with them,” Jentsch said. “It’s super encouraging because they are at such a high level.”
The Maroon and White compete in compound, barebow, Olympic recurve and fixed pin classifications. Agricultural leadership and development sophomore Bayli Honeycutt competes in the compound bow category.
“Compound is composed of two cams, a string and a cable,” Honeycutt said. “It’s one of the more complex bow styles. In my opinion, it’s one of the harder ones because it’s a lot more technical.”
For agricultural systems management freshman Trapper Feuerbacher, the club is where he has found community at A&M.
“We’re very competitive, but not only that, we’re a family,” Feurebacher said. “Together, each and every one of us knows each other by name. It’s not like you have to show up for practice, but everybody wants to show up for practice. Everybody wants to get better, and they want to get better together, which is why we’re 23-time National Champions, going on hopefully another.”
For a complete list of categories, shoot times and lines on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, visit A&M Archery’s Instagram page, @tamutargetarchers.
