KIDDERMINSTER Olympian Naomi Folkard has been selected in a 13-strong Great Britain squad competing in the first leg of the Archery World Cup .

The event is taking place from April 22-27 in Shanghai, China.

Seven female and six male athletes selected from both recurve and compound categories. These athletes will compete on both an individual and team basis (one team for each discipline, male and female and a mixed team competition).

Shooting recurve, which is the Olympic sport, Archery GB has selected a mix of experience and youth. Naomi Folkard, Amy Oliver and Larry Godfrey who are all hugely experienced and were part of Team GB at the London Olympics will be joined by Nicky Hunt, who won two Gold medals at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in the compound discipline and has since switched to recurve, and rookies Sean Evans (22) and Bradley Denny (16), less experienced at senior level but both exciting talent prospects.

Lloyd Brown, Olympic Coach of Archery GB: “Competition amongst places is fierce and at the selection shoots the quality rises to the top. Naomi, Amy, Larry and Nicky will feel more comfortable in this setting and we have high hopes for them. Whilst this will be a great opportunity for Sean and Bradley to establish themselves in the senior squad.”

Representing Great Britain in the other discipline are seven compound archers, three females and four males. It is an experienced team with Duncan Busby, Adam Ravenscroft, Claudine Jennings and Lucy O’Sullivan. Mark Rudd and Linda Townsend will be representing Great Britain for the first time.

Following the qualification round, the archers will compete in a head to head event, run in the same format as the Olympics/Paralympics, with a 70m target for the recurve archers and a 50m target for the compound archers.

The Archery World Championships has been held since 1931 and is organised by the World Archery Federation.