Azernews.Az

By Amina Nazarli

Azerbaijan, which has become a usual and exemplary venue for major sporting events, will host another prestigious competition -- the European Championships in Trampoline Gymnastics in 2018.

The Land of Fire has repeatedly hosted important competitions in gymnastics, but Trampoline Gymnastics is a relatively new gymnastics discipline for the country.

Baku was entrusted to hold the event during the regular meeting of the Executive Committee of the European Olympic Committees that took place in Lausanne, Azerbaijan Gymnastics Federation reported.

While athletes and sport fans will impatiently be counting down the days left to the start of the Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, the City of Winds will bring together rhythmic gymnasts.

This year Baku will welcome a caravan of competitors of 2016 Olympic year’s first World Cup series in Artistic Gymnastics on February 19-21, followed by World Cup series in Trampoline Gymnastics on March 5-6.

Trampoline Gymnastics has started to develop in Azerbaijan since late 2013, but could have become increasingly popular throughout the country.

The first athlete, representing the country in the international arena was Ruslan Aghamirov, who performed at the World Cup in Denmark in 2013.

The national trampoline gymnastics team made a breakthrough in autumn 2014, where for the first time in the history of independent Azerbaijan, Oleg Piunov and Ilya Grishunin became prizewinners of the World Cup in Portugal performing in synchronized pairing.

In 2015, individual and synchronized trampolines were included in the program of the inaugural European Games, hosting more than 6,000 athletes from 50 countries in Baku last summer. Ilya Grishunin claimed bronze medal at the Games in Gymnastics Artistic Trampoline.

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Amina Nazarli is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli

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