Chase also plays soccer and baseball, but his first love is archery. That became clear when he told his parents, Terry and Katie Card of Scandia, that he wanted to shoot at the Lancaster Archery Classic.

A little different than shooting at the local competitions held throughout Warren and Erie counties, this event was held at the largest indoor sports complex in the United States.

How big is the building? 750,000 square feet of usable space to be exact.

Spooky Nook Sports, located in Lancaster, was home to the second-largest indoor competition in the United States, trailing only the world competition event held in Las Vegas every year.

Chase Card with his targets after his round. Submitted Photo

This year’s event at Spooky Nook drew shooters from all over the world, more than 2,000 in total. Some of the countries represented included Germany, India, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland. The entire South Korean Olympic team was there as well as college teams from across the United States.

Chase is a confident young man who calmly explained the process of shooting at Spooky Nook.

“I was nervous at first, but once I realized it was just shooting arrows at a target, I thought I did pretty good for my first time at a big competition.”

All the young man had to do was shoot 20 rounds — a round consisting of three arrows — wait for the all clear, then score his round and then return and wait on the line for the next round to begin.

“It really came down to a battle of stamina as the 20 rounds took about four hours to get through, so it was tough for him to get into a rhythm, but he did really well,” Terry Card said. “We are really proud of him.”

Chase shot with 25 other children in the under-12 group, many of them fully sponsored by the big bow companies. It can be an expensive sport to get into.

“He just spent $500 of his own money, cleaned out his piggy bank to upgrade his bow. He only had a week to get used to it, in fact,” Terry Card said.

Chase finished 11th in his class and did, in fact, beat a few of those sponsored shooters, but if you were to ask Chase the best part of it wasn’t finishing 11th, it was getting to hang out with one of the top shooters in the world, Reo Wilde, who was there competing.

“It was great just talking to Reo,” Chase said. “He was giving me tips all the time.”

The event was new for Chase’s parents as well, because Chase normally shoots in local competitions.

“I is something he’s always wanted to do so we wanted to support him,” Terry Card said. “The event was a lot of fun and the atmosphere was really family oriented. Everybody was cheering for all of the shooters and were ready to answer all of our questions. And, trust me, we asked a lot.”

Chase wanted to thank his sponsors, including Cutting Edge Graphics, Terry Card Home Improvements, Starbrick Machining, Southern Tier Trailers and Allegheny Outfitters. Chase, who is always looking for sponsors, has his own YouTube channel, and he can be found on Facebook and YouTube under Chasen’ the wild.

Always confident, Chase said, “I’ll do better next time now that I know what it’s like.”