LAC LA BICHE - Volunteers who stepped forward to lend a helping hand for the 2024 World Field Archery Championships were shown appreciation for their hard work and dedication with a special dinner that took place at the end of October.
Just under half of the 140 volunteers who worked both during the major international sporting competition and as part of the preparations in the months leading up to it attended the event, Oct. 25.
The 2024 World Archery Field Championships took place in Lac La Biche from Sept. 16-22 and featured 250 world class archers from 28 countries.
While those archers competed against each other to win gold, silver and bronze medals, the large group of volunteers, recognizable in their bright yellow shirts, performed a variety of duties including security, concessions, drug testing, cooking and serving food, as well as cleanup.
Other volunteers cleared trails and set up targets for the six days of shooting.
Following the appreciation dinner, the volunteers, family members and guests gathered inside the shooting area of the Lakeland Archers club for a group photo. Those who attended the event also received an assortment of door prizes.
Rene Schaub, president of the Lakeland Archers, praised the hard work done by the volunteers, saying their efforts were important to the success of the tournament.
“Any big event, you can’t do without volunteers,” Schaub told Lakeland This Week.
The Lakeland Archers club, who also hosted the 2014 Canadian Outdoor Archery Championships, as well as the 2019 World 3D Archery Championship, is getting set to bring another major archery competition to Lac La Biche - the Canadian Outdoor Archery Championships from Aug. 1-10, 2025.
According to Schaub, preparations are going well for the national event.
The Lakeland Archers will be hosting 3D, field, and target archery shooting competitions for the Canadian Outdoor Archery Championships.
“We’ve got all the targets ready for both the 3D and the field,” Schaub explained, adding that arrangements have also been made to host the target shooting on the artificial turf fields adjacent to the Bold Center.
Among the volunteers who attended the dinner were Dale Crossland and Bambi John Crocker.
Crossland, a volunteer coordinator and a member of the Lac La Biche Trappers Local 1120, was involved with organizing his fellow trappers, who helped get the trails and targets ready several months prior to the start of the 2024 World Archery Field Championships.
“Trappers helped with setting up targets, with clearing trails, with helping make the trails before the event ever took place,” Crossland said.
Members of the trappers’ organization also assisted with preparing food, hauling water and making fires to keep the referees and judges warm.
Crossland describes the experience of volunteering at the archery tournament as being “very busy,” but also “very interesting.”
He added, “It was amazing to see how many people showed up and all the different things that were going on.”
Spectators who took in the archery shoots may have been met by Bambi John Crocker, who was part of the contingent of volunteers responsible for security and access control during the international competition.
For Crocker, helping out was an enjoyable experience. It gave her the opportunity to mingle with people who came to Lac La Biche from around the globe.
“I met a lot of beautiful people from all over the world,” she said.
