Azernews.Az

By Nigar Orujova

Azerbaijani gymnasts Oleg Stepko and Kristina Pravdina won gold medals in the all-around competition at the Open Joint Azerbaijan Championships in Gymnastics in Baku.

The test championship on the eve of the European Games is underway in the Azerbaijani capital on March 4-6. Coming from 22 countries, 133 gymnasts will compete for medals both in the all-around and the individual competitions.

Azerbaijan’s representative, Oleg Stepko with 90,600 points won the gold medal among the men in all-around competition following all rotations.

Another Azerbaijani gymnast, Petr Pahnyuk with 88,050 points settled for the silver medal.

The Croatian winner of the Olympic Games in London, Filip Ude with 86,100 points captured the bronze medal.

Azerbaijani gymnast, Kristina Pravdina with 50,339 points is in the lead in the all-around competition among women.

Turkish gymnast, Tutya Yilmaz with 50,131 points settled for the second spot, after making some gross mistakes in the last rotation. Another gymnast for Turkey, Demet Mutlu won the bronze medal with 49,332 points.

Addressing the opening ceremony, Georges Guelzec, the president of the European Union of Gymnastics said that the championship is an historic moment – an entirely new gymnastics format.

“I hope that you all, the spectators as well as the gymnasts, will utterly enjoy the performances,” he said.

He wished all athletes and federations a lot of success for the test event of the 1st European Games.

Gymnastics is one of the 20 sports of the inaugural European Games that will be held in Baku on June 12-28. Baku 2015 will attract more than 6,000 athletes to represent 50 countries.

Azerbaijan has become the venue for the prestigious international competitions, and the revival of Azerbaijani sport is at the center of world attention, said Ismayil Ismayilov, Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports.

"World and European championships, international tournaments held in Azerbaijan were organized at a high level," he said at the event.

He connects this with the positive feedback from the international sports organizations on regularly holding such events in Azerbaijan.

"Azerbaijan organized 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 said on March 4.

Speaking about the championship in gymnastics, he said that it had been organized well.

“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 come today to cheer for our athletes,” he said.

Huseynzade said that the main task of all gymnasts in the championship is to win medals.

“There are high expectations from the Azerbaijani athletes in all types of 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.

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Nigar Orujova is AzerNews’s staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @o_nigar

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