Iranian para archer Zahra Nemati has been shortlisted by the World Archery Organization for the 2017 Athlete of the Year in the category of para woman archers.
World Archery is the international governing body for the sport of archery. Its mission is to promote and regulate archery worldwide, developing the sport with over 160 member associations through international events, development initiatives and marketing and endorsed by the International Olympic Committee, International Paralympics Committee and the International World Games Association, among others.
According to Worldarchery.org, it is responsible for setting rules and regulations for international archery events, organizing the World Archery Championships at the Olympic Games, Paralympics Games and World Games.
Zahra Nemati is a Paralympics and Olympics archer. She originally competed in taekwondo before she was paralyzed in a car accident.
In 2006 she started as an archer and within six months finished third in the national championships.
Gold From London Paralympics
Nemati was at her best at the 2012 London Paralympic Games and won gold in the women’s individual recurve category and a bronze medal in women’s team recurve.
Again in the 2016 Rio Paralympic games she fought for the title and the results was success. She took gold in the women’s individual recurve, and silver in the women’s team recurve.
Gold medals from the 2014 Incheon Asian Para Games and 2013 Bangkok World Para-Archery Championships are her other honors.
By winning gold at the 2012 London Paralympics, Nemati became the first Iranian woman ever to win a gold medal either in the Olympics or Paralympics.
Nemati currently holds first place in the International Paralympics ranking for women para archers.
The voting portal at Worldarchery.org is open to the public until February 7 and everyone can vote by choosing an archer in each of the six categories of recurve men, recurve women, compound men, compound women, para men and para women.
Nominees include the four new World Archery Champions, plus World Archery Para Champions and world number ones.
Competing with Nemati for archer of the year prize are four other para women archers in the shortlist: Tatiana Andrievskaia, Russian archer who finished second at her first ever World Archery Para Championships in Beijing; Jane Karla Gogel, world number three from Brazil who competed in both the World Archery Para Championships and World Archery Championships in 2017; Jessica Stretton from the UK who has the 2016 Summer Paralympics gold medal and Chinese athlete Jiaman Zhou, champion in the Rio 2016 Paralympics and Beijing 2017 World Archery Para Games.
Winners will be announced during the Indoor Archery World Cup Final to be held after the second day of The Vegas Shoot in the US on February 10.
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