Today, competitions in the program of the 14th World Kurash Championship started in the Martial Arts Sports Complex of the Olympic village of the capital.

Organization of the tournament of world scale in white marble-coated Ashgabat clearly speaks of close attention given by President Serdar Berdimuhamedov as well as National Leader of the Turkmen people, Chairman of the Khalk Maslakhaty Hero-Arkadag to development of popular physical culture and sports that directly promotes steady increase of the authority of Turkmenistan on the international sports arena.

In recent years, wide opportunities have been created for development of sports movement - modern sports complexes, multipurpose stadiums and other profile projects completed with necessary facilities have been constructed in all regions.

Emergence of the Olympic village with modern sports complexes in Ashgabat, which has no analogue in Central Asia, facilitated to bring Turkmen sports out into a new higher level. It is there that in 2017 the V Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games were held with great success and opened a new bright page in the history of national sports.

The «Amul-Khazar 2018» International Rally as well as World Weightlifting Championships that were held in 2018 had a great significance for perfecting skills of national sportsmen and recognition of Turkmenistan as largest sports power.

Thus, launching and organizing landmark events in the sports life of the planet, Turkmenistan as a full-fledged member of the International Olympic Committee and the Olympic Council of Asia, makes a weighty contribution to expansion and popularisation of Olympic movement and active attraction of the youth to it.

The present World Kurash Championship has brought together sportsmen from four continents of the planet - Asia, Africa, Europe as well as South and North America and for this reason, has evoked a huge interest in this event in many countries of the world.

All this attests to a growing interest of the planet in kurash, the history of which goes back to millenniums, acts as an integral part of national holidays and festivals. From the early 20th century this type of belt wrestling, which forbids blows, painful holds and choking techniques, began to be popularises all over the world, including in Turkmenistan. 

In our country, kurash has gained a prompt development after establishment of the National Federation of this single combat in December 2014. After the admission of the Kurash Federation of Turkmenistan to the corresponding International Association (IKA) and the Kurash Confederation of Asia and Oceania (KCAO), since 2015, Turkmen masters of this type of wrestling began to participate in world championships and other major international competitions, including Asian beach games, Asian indoor and martial arts games, World martial arts games and Asian championships. In different years in all those competitions, our compatriots brought home medals of various denominations. Until the present world championship in Ashgabat, Turkmen sportsmen have taken part in four world kurash championships in Iran, Turkey, Republic of Korea and India, at which 21 times they stood in the honour platform and won a total of 2 gold, 7 silver and 12 bronze medals.

Our wrestlers also continued victorious traditions in the present world championship, in which 15 complete sets of awards in seven man's and eight female weight categories are played. Today champions and prize-winners in three heaviest weight categories of men and in five of women were defined. And in each of them Turkmen kurash wrestlers have received medals.

By the outcome of the first day of competitions, Turkmen nationals have won to gold, three silver and three bronze medals.

The first gold for the team of Turkmenistan was secured by Dinara Rozykulova (weight category under 63 kg). On the way to this success, she won in the quarterfinal Snehal Ramesh Kaware (India), in the semi-final she caught the throw and won a pure victory over Tahereh Azarpeyvand (Iran), and in the final in a persistent wrestling, she took an upper hand over Wan Ting Lee (Chinese Taipei) who was awarded silver medal. Iranian Tahereh Azarpeyvand and Russian Vladlena Guseva who performed under the flag of the International Kurash Association (IKA) became bronze prize-winners in this weight category.

Maria Lohova (under 70 kg) won the second gold medal on the team of Turkmenistan. Four years ago, this talented sportswoman became champion of Asia at competitions in Pune of India. And now she has added a rank of the world champion to this title, having won Seenu Seenu in the quarterfinal (India), in the semi-final – Lee Hyun Tuon Wee (Vietnam) and in the final - Donya Aghaei (Iran) who became silver prize-winner. Bronze medals in this weight category were awarded to Lee Hyun Tuon Wee (Vietnam) and Azhar Salykova (Kazakhstan).

Silver awards in our team have went to: vice-world champion of 2022 and bronze medallist of the world championship of 2019 Ayshirin Haydarova, world champion of 2019 and bronze prize-winner of the ХIХ Asian summer games in Hangzhou (China) Aynur Amanova and Sanjar Abdyrahmanov.

Ayshirin Haydarova secured a silver in the category under 48 kg in which she took priority over Ulbusin Khakimova (Uzbekistan) and bronze medal winners were Savira Dyah Fitri Rizkianti (Indonesia) and Begumnaz Dogruyol (Turkey).

Aynur Amanova has risen on the second step of the podium in the weight class under 52 kg in which Hilola Ortiqboyeva (Uzbekistan) became world champion and Nada Ashraf (Egypt) and Yu-Suan Chuan (Chinese Taipei) bronze prize-winners.

Sanjar Abdyrahmanov won a silver medal in the weight category under 90 kg in which the award of the highest standard went to Erkin Kozokov (Uzbekistan), and bronze medals – to Masoud Gavibazu (Iran) and Zhamalbek Asylbek Uulu (Kirghiz Republic).

Gulshat Annaeva, Ruslan Esgerov and Sapa Sapaev became bronze prize-winners in the team of Turkmenistan.

Gulshat Annaeva secured a bronze medal in the weight category under 57 kg in which Rauza Nurmahammetova (Kazakhstan) took the third step of the podium, the second step by Pardis Eydivandi (Iran) and the first one by Nguyen Thi Bich Ngoc (Vietnam).

Ruslan Esgerov achieved a bronze medal in the weight category under 100 kg in which the second bronze medal went to Firdavs Nasimov (Tajikistan), a silver one to Hamed Rashidi (Iran) and a gold one to Jamshid Mamatrahimov (Uzbekistan).

In the super heavy weight category over 100 kg prize-winning places were distributed so: the first place went to Muhsin Hisomiddinov (Uzbekistan), the second one to Abolfazl Torabi (Iran) and the third one to Sapa Sapaev (Turkmenistan) and Khurshed Madzhidov (Tajikistan).

On November 28, four men’s and three women’s teams will compete for other 7 complete sets of medals in the World Kurash Championship.