Azerbaijani senior coach on archery: 'We will try to compete for a medal' - INTERVIEW

Baku. 13 February. REPORT.AZ/ Senior coach of Azerbaijan on archery gave an interview to the Report News Agency. 

- Could you tell us how to develop a sport like an archery in Azerbaijan?

- Archery - is a long time developing sport in Azerbaijan. About since 1968, he has been developed in the country. In Soviet times, the results of Azerbaijani sportsmen have been pretty good.

I am from Moldova coach, I was invited to work here and for five years, since I came here.I must say that over the last 4 years athletes improved.Athletes began to travel around, some athletes achieved results.There was a team, both male and female.The men's team in 2013, the year in the Islamic Games in Indonesia ranked second.That is, by far, the team is worth something, and preparing for some serious competition.

Archery like any other sport, requires an investment.Federation handles with these investments.

Each year, acquired new bows, they are improving every year and, of course, the whole world is focused on the new, as new is the best and people grow with new bows.

- If you look from the side, it seems that archery fairly easy sport - pulled the bowstring and shot. What difficulties are in this sport?

- Yes, it seems easy from outside, but there are a lot of difficulties.Firstly, it all starts from small.How to put the technique of preparation, and an athlete will shoot, technically would cope with a shot.

But this is a very false impression that it's all easy.Men, for example, the tension force of arrows ranges from 12.5 to 22 kilograms.That is, the holding force of the string are recorded in kilograms.

Athlete shooting at 150-200 times in training, and if you multiply that by weight, it turns out that in training he picks up tons.This shows that archery is a difficult sport, exercise is still large.They have to deal with and, of course, we do not only shooting, but also the general physical preparation.But the most important thing is the psychology.It is important that the athlete was psychologically stable at competitions.And here in archery associated with aiming, attention, getting into the top ten, of course, it is necessary to keep attention to such an extent to not to miss.Any excitement, any jitters, any stressful situation affects its result, its technical work, which is stable in training.Without psychology, it is very difficult to obtain results in competitions.

- What is easy in this sport?

- Firstly, this sport is beautiful, it is intelligent, as we always call it.If a person wants to achieve results, it has to go through hard work, but it is never easy.

- This year Baku will host the first European Games.What can you say about that?

- Games of this magnitude to held for the first time.There are Asian, Pan American Games, now decided to hold the first European game.All this is very serious competition and they will be held at the Olympic Games.

The fact that they are held in Baku, is an important factor for us, as the burden of responsibility on our shoulders.

We set ourselves any plans, objectives, desirable, of course, to fight for a medal.

I'll tell you that competition in Europe in archery is very high, and the leading countries of Europe are coming to us - the athletes from the Netherlands, Russia, Bulgaria - the countries that have proven their result that they are leading.Here in this strong competition, we have to work and prepare for these games.

- How many of the Azerbaijani national team will participate in the Games?

- To date, we have selected for Games 4-5 5-6 men and women on the team, which will consist of three men and three women.We, as the host country, were given the right to put the whole team.There will be 64 women and 64 men.

There will be 12 teams, and maybe 13, but it will depend on competition on quota.

- How many medals do you expect from the team at the Games?

- As I said, the competition is very high. Here come the best marksmen in Europe, but we will try to compete for a medal.Which program I don't know whether it's a team, or a mixed team, or in the standings, but I rely on men, because it is more stable.The women's team, we, so to speak, laid down, but it is of course lower on one class. It's about the team, there is certainly a strong individual arrows, but as we speak, just about the same coin.