FROM a South African farm to the yard of a Yanchep home, Danie-Louis Oosthuizen has been honing his archery craft for nearly a decade.
The teenager is ranked the best bowman in Australia for his age in field archery and third for target shooting.
Target shooting is the type seen at the Olympics with a fixed target, whereas field shooting involves walking between targets on a set course.
Get in front of tomorrow's news for FREE
Journalism for the curious Australian across politics, business, culture and opinion.
READ NOWOosthuizen (15) prefers field competition, where he faces the added challenge of shooting up and down hills.
He first picked up a bow when he was six.
“We used to live on a farm in South Africa where my dad would go hunting,” he said.
“When we came to Australia, Dad started to do competition archery and I joined in and have not stopped since.”
The archer has dreams of becoming the best in the world, which does not seem unrealistic given his rapid progress in just two years of competitive shooting.
Outside his national accolades, he has won three-straight WA field championships, back-to-back target championships and the 2016 indoor competition.
“What I like most about archery is when you just have one of those great days where you can just constantly shoot all your arrows in the middle with no struggle,” he said.
“But that does not come with no effort, it takes practice and practice to achieve this and does not happen every day unfortunately.”
Oosthuizen trains with the Benara Bowmen at Whiteman Park on the weekends and practices for an hour at home each day.
He is a nominee in the Community Newspaper Group Local Sports Stars awards in the Junior Individual category.
Visit www.localsportsstars.com.au to nominate another young athlete.
MORE: Severe weather warning issued for Perth, deluge to continue
MORE: Armadale tradie to buy new barbie after $6 million Lotto win
MORE: 95-year-old woman killed after being hit by car in Kardinya