Ruiz’s next competition following Shanghai was Tlaxcala 2026, and for many in Mexico that week, it was the biggest competition of the outdoor season.
You could say she timed her adjustment perfectly for the continental tournament. She defeated the eventual Saltillo silver medallist Dafne Quintero, the 2025 South American champion Alejandra Usquiano and the greatest ever Sara Lopez in succession – the win against Lopez the only one by a single point, 148-147 – to successfully defend her Pan American crown.
On top of that, she and James Lutz picked up gold in the compound mixed team.
But for all of Ruiz’s momentum heading into Saltillo, what came next threw it all into the air.
The Arizona native – a qualified nurse at a children’s hospital away from the shooting line – endured a car crash in her home city of Phoenix.
Thankfully, her injuries were minor, with no broken bones or internal bleeding, although Ruiz revealed that her ribs, shoulders and hips were “pretty bruised”. A truck had hit the driver’s side door directly, sending the left side of her body, including her head, into the door and window.
“I was very lucky during the car crash to come out with the least amount of injuries as possible,” she said.
Ruiz was not allowed to shoot for 10 days after the accident and had to rebuild her training gradually. Even by the time she travelled to Saltillo, she was barely managing more than 100 arrows a day.
The incident occurred on 8 August, just nine days before World Archery announced the final confirmed line-up, with Ruiz making the 32-athlete roster based on the points she had accrued from Puebla, Shanghai and Madrid 2026.
She had just a month before she would fly to Saltillo, and training in such a short space of time with that extent of injuries was never going to be easy.
