Baku to host World Alpagut Cup
By Laman Ismayilova
The "Sarhadchi" Sport Olympic Complex will host 2nd World Alpagut Cup on November 24-26.
More than 300 athletes from Azerbaijan, Turkey, Germany, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, Russia, Hungary, Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Ukraine will take part in the World Cup.
Co-organized by the Youth and Sports Ministry, Martial Arts Federations, World and Azerbaijani Alpine Federations, the championship will be held in the following styles: aypara, batur, jaimaz and guresh.
Alpagut is a martial art with its canons, traditions and philosophy. The word Alpagut consists of two words- Alp which means ‘warrior’ and kulsal that means ‘saint’. These are saint soldiers who battled for the sake of national and universal ideals.
The ancient sport which combines mixed Turkic martial arts consists of three systems: Aypara, Batur, and Jaimaz.
The fighting usually takes place in the wolf and falcon circle. Wolf and falcon circles are the totem that belongs to the Turkic world. The fight lasts two minutes.
A lot of alpagut sports schools were opened in Azerbaijan, Turkey, Georgia, Australia, Iran, the U.S., Canada, Germany, Hungary and the Czech Republic.
The Azerbaijani team ranked first in the overall medal count of the first Alpagut World Cup held in Georgia last year. The national fighters won 51 medals, including 24 gold, 22 silver and 5 bronze.
One of the memorable moments of the competition was the victory of Azerbaijani fighter Elvin over the three-time world champion in kickboxing Temuri Glonti .
The Shagan Olympic Complex hosted the third National Alpagut Championship on March 11.
The tournament brought together 370 athletes from country's 30 regions. Young athletes aged between 8 and 18 years competed in various weight categories.
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Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova
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