Baku, Azerbaijan, March 4
By Maksim Tsurkov - Trend:
Azerbaijan organizes the gymnastics competitions better than anyone in the world, Adil Huseynzade, the director of Baku Gymnastics School, internationally certified judge on trampoline and tumbling, Azerbaijan's honored coach told Trend on March 4.
Speaking about the Open Joint Azerbaijan Championships in Gymnastics that kicked off in Baku on March 4, he said that it has been organized well.
Coming from 22 countries, 133 gymnasts will compete for medals both in the all-around and the individual competitions.
"I was in the competitions in many countries and I can say with confidence that Azerbaijan is the best organizer of tournaments in the world," said the honored coach. "It is necessary to emphasize the services of our Gymnastics Federation in this regard."
He added that there are many young spectators and gymnasts in the stands of the National Gymnastics Arena.
"The whole Baku Gymnastics School has today come to cheer for our athletes," he said.
Huseynzade said that the main task of the gymnasts in the championship is to win medals.
"There are high expectations from the Azerbaijani athletes in all types of the competitions," he said. "Previously, we were strong only in rhythmic gymnastics, but today, we count on getting rewards in all types."
"Our gymnasts Oleg Stepko and Petr Pakhnyuk are currently in the first-rate training and we can expect medals from them in the Games [First European Games]," Huseynzade added.
Meanwhile, Azerbaijani gymnasts won gold medals at Baku's Championships in Gymnastics. Oleg Stepko and Kristina Pravdina won gold medals in the all-around competition among men and women respectively.
The European Games themselves will be hosted in Baku on June 12-28, 2015. There will be a total of 20 sports at Baku 2015: 16 Olympic sports and four non-Olympic sports. More than 6,000 athletes from across Europe will be representing their nations over 17 days of competition. Baku was awarded the games by the European Olympic Committees (EOC) in December 2012.
Edited by SI
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