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Azerbaijan has the world's best gymnastics complex, the head coach of the Azerbaijani national rhythmic gymnastics Mariana Vasileva told Trend March 5.

"And this is not just my opinion,” she said. “All specialists and guests, visiting the complex, have not seen this type of complex anywhere."

Vasileva said that the athletes do not even realize that they have such a good arena.

“Our athletes have never worked in poor conditions and they don't have anything to compare with,” she said. “But as I began working in other conditions, I can see a tremendous difference. I can appreciate everything for the gymnastics development in the country.”

"All conditions were created to develop this kind of sport,” she said. “I would like to express my gratitude to our President Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva."

“I try to teach the athletes to appreciate what they are given, and that they were responsible and show the corresponding results,” said the head coach.

She said that in the past six years, the rhythmic gymnastics has become one of the most popular types of sport in Azerbaijan.

Vasileva added that rhythmic gymnastics sections were opened in seven regions of Azerbaijan, and now 217 gymnasts are training in those regions.

“I think it is a very good start,” she said.

Vasileva declined to make predictions about the results of the Azerbaijani national rhythmic gymnastics team at the current championship.

“This is the second start for our girls,” she said. “And for some individual competitors it is a debut. At the moment, the girls are well prepared.”

Vasileva said the Azerbaijani gymnasts fulfilled the task set during the working process.

She added that it's a little hard to perform at home, because everyone are expecting good results, not just good performance, but believes the athletes will cope with their tasks.

The head coach said many strong gymnasts from other countries have come to the championship, adding that Yana Kudryavtseva the two-time absolute world champion will perform during the championship.

“But I believe that our gymnasts do not lag behind in terms of training,” she said. “So, everything depends on their performance.”

Moreover, the head coach said that there is still time to prepare well for the European championships that will be held in two and a half months and for the European Games which will take place in three months.

“I expect good performance at the European Games,” Vasileva said. “As you know, the president of our Federation is Mehriban Aliyeva and we should always represent her worthily.”

Furthermore, the head coach said that Azerbaijani athletes show good results in other types of gymnastics as well. She reminded that the all-around competitions in artistic gymnastics among men and women were completed on Mar.4.

“I can say that we have an excellent performance and a good result,” she said. “Oleg Stepko became the undisputed champion of Azerbaijan. Petr Pahnyuk won the silver medal. Eldar Safarov also made an excellent performance, who managed to recover a little after injury and surgery. I was surprised by the difficult new compositions he performed. I am very pleased with the result we have at the moment.”

In addition, Vassileva recalled that Azerbaijani gymnast Kristina Pravdina won the first place among women on all-around competition on competitive gymnastics.

“This is her first gold medal,” she said. “She became a champion of Azerbaijan for the first time. I congratulate her on this.”

However, according to Vassileva, there is still something to strive for and something to work on.

“Today, athletes perform on trampoline and aerobics,” she said. “These sports and women's competitive gymnastics are young kinds of sports, and we have only begun to develop them. So far, we have pretty good results. But we should wait until the end of the competition. However, I think that the coaching staff and we all together will analyze what we should work on after the event.”

The Open Joint Azerbaijan Championships in Gymnastics kicked off in Baku on March 4. This is the test championship on the eve of the First European Games.

Coming from 22 countries, 133 gymnasts will compete for medals both in the all-around and the individual competitions.

Such stars of world gymnastics as two-time absolute world champion Yana Kudryavtseva (Russia, rhythmic gymnastics) Olympic silver medalist Filip Ude (Croatia), European champion Alexander Shatilov (Israel, both – competitive gymnastics) and many others are among them.

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