Rhythmic gymnastics in Azerbaijan has taken a huge step forward in just the last three months, the official ambassador of the 37th Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships in Baku, multiple world champion and silver medalist of the 1996 Olympics Yana Batyrshina said in an interview with the Vestnik Kavkaza correspondent.
“It was a pleasure to be in Azerbaijan. I was at the European Championship a few months ago, and now I see that there has been a tremendous leap forward. That is, for three months of work, a huge leap forward was made. I congratulate Zohra Agamirova, and all the girls from the group team, head coach Mariana Vasileva, the Azerbaijan Gymnastics Federation. They have shown a tremendous result. This is an excellent result. They managed to achieve what they wanted, "the ambassador of the World Championship said.
“Some other teams surprised me as well. I realized that many other countries are also good in gymnastics, they showed it today in the group exercises. The Japanese team won gold in the exercise with five balls when Russians stumbled a little. So I discovered the Japanese team in the group exercises. I feel that they will prepare even better at home for Tokyo 2020, and the Russian girls will have to work harder,” Yana Batyrshina warned.
Answering the question of whether it was difficult to be the ambassador of the World Championship, she emphasized that very many people would like to be in her shoes. "I am happy, and, as I expected, I am very sad that everything ended. It seemed that the competitions were long, but time flew by so quickly. Now it remains only to revise video, re-read interviews and watch photos. I am extremely lucky. Not everyone get such an experience. Therefore, I’m just happy that I was an ambassador and the competitions took place in Azerbaijan, in Baku. It’s a great pleasure. Thank you all, " the ambassador said.
In addition, she noted that for the first time she was able to watch the gymnastic tournament in full, from beginning to end, without being distracted by anything. “For the first time in my life, I was at the World Championship on the other side of the screen, I could see everything with my own eyes. The organization, everything…the attitude towards me was great. Thank you so much. Congratulations to everyone”, - Yana Batyrshina said.
