Azernews.Az

By Abdul Kerimkhanov

On September 22, the final day of the 37th Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships kicked-off at the National Gymnastics Arena in Baku, Azernews reported.

According to the results of the competition, Japanese national team won the victory with 29.550 points. Bulgaria lagged behind the winner by only 0.200 points and settled for the second place. The Russian team today was content with a bronze medal (28.150).

Ron Galimore, member of the Jury of Appeal of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), Caroline Hunt, as well as FIG Technical Committee member and Director of the National Gymnastics Arena Magsud Farzullayev presented awards.

At 15:15, the group finals exercises were held with three hoops and two pairs of clubs, where the Azerbaijani team also performed. The team included Ayshan Bayramova, Diana Ahmadbayli, Aliya Pashayeva, Zeynab Hummatova and Daria Sorokina.

As for the results of this program, the Russian team scored gold, scoring 29.450 points. The team from Japan this time won a silver medal (29.400). Italy joined the top three (29.200). Azerbaijan national team scored 26.450 points and took the seventh place.

Morinari Watanabe, President of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), Mariana Vasileva, the head coach of the Azerbaijani team in rhythmic gymnastics and Yana Batyrshina, ambassador of the 37th Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships in Baku, presented awards.

The last day of the competition was remembered by the large number of fans who came to support their gymnasts. Flags of Russia, Ukraine, the USA, Bulgaria, Israel, and Japan could be seen in the stadium. Local fans were waving Azerbaijan’s national flag.

The audience was entertained by the mascot Gur-Gur, the mischievous frog, who gave a lot of smiles to gymnasts and fans. Note that the image of Gur-Gur was embodied by two professional American showmen - Scott Hesington and Barry Anderson.

The closing ceremony of the 37th Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships took place on the same day. It was marked by the Azerbaijani national dances. In addition, the honored artist Miri Yusif attended the ceremony to perform the song “Be the first”, written especially for these competitions.

On this, the beautifully-organized world championship came to an end.

The 37th Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships are the qualification competition for the Olympic Games to be held in Tokyo next year. More than 300 gymnasts from 61 countries are competing for nine sets of medals. The motto of the championships is “Fairy Tales will come to life".

The 37th Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships took place between September 16 and September 22.

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Abdul Kerimkhanov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @AbdulKerim94

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