Azerbaijan's increasing significance for world gymnastics is natural, the First Vice-President of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), President of the Federation of Sporting Gymnastics of Russia, First Vice-President and Chairman of the VTB Bank Management Board Vasily Titov, said, speaking with the correspondent of Vestnik Kavkaza on the sidelines of the meeting of the FIG presidential commission in Baku.
"Azerbaijan takes a very active stance in promoting various sports, including gymnastics, the republic has good positions in both rhythmic and artistic gymnastics. In addition, the Secretary General of the Azerbaijan Gymnastics Federation, Farid Gaibov, is also vice-president of the European Gymnastics Union (UEG). Therefore, I think that Azerbaijan's increasing significance is quite natural," he stressed, wishing Farid Gaibov luck in the election of the UEG president.
The Baku meeting of the presidential commission will serve as a preparation for the meeting of the FIG Executive Committee, which will be held tomorrow. "We discussed everything related to the agenda of the forthcoming executive committee, providing recommendations on the work, including on issues related to changes in the rules of the Olympic qualifying process and on relations with parkour. But it is at a very preliminary stage," Vasily Titov said.
The First Vice-President of FIG paid attention to such a problem of modern gymnastics as the reduction of sports life to one Olympic cycle. "It is a challenge that we all are facing, and it needs to be discussed, because we do not understand very well the medical and other consequences of the fact that a peak of sports activities of adolescent body falls on a period of growth.There are people, who share this concern, because we are complicating the program and are forced to pay for it with the youth of our athletes. There is a general understanding of the problem, and we will discuss it," he said.
"Gymnastics is not an easy sport. Thankfully, there are a lot of young talented athletes in Russia now, we have a fairly long bench, although filling this bench requires a lot of effort. The past European Championship showed that despite the renewal of the national team by 60%, we showed a very decent result and, in fact, won the team championship at the expense of our youth. It gives us some hope, although we will have to work really hard. Now there are a lot of sport stars, but it's important for them to keep shining and not become one-time ones," Vasily Titov concluded.
