Early victory in the medal standings: Russian wrestlers won four more gold at the European Championship in Warsaw

Winning double of the classics

Greco-Roman wrestlers started drawing medals at the European Championship, which is taking place these days in Warsaw.

On Saturday, the winners were selected in five weight classes.

Athletes from the Russian national team climbed the podium four times, including twice - to the highest step.

The first gold was brought by the lightest wrestler in the team, Emin Sefershaev, performing in the weight category up to 55 kg.

The main fight for the Crimean wrestler was the semi-final against the 2018 world champion Eldeniz Azizli from Azerbaijan.

For a long time, the Russian could not take possession of the advantage, and 18 seconds before the end of the meeting he was losing at all with a score of 2: 4.

But Sefershaev managed not only to recoup, but also to come out ahead by one point.

After that, it was not difficult for the Russian to win the final bout against the Turk Ekrem Ozturk.

Starting the fight with points for passivity and pushing off the carpet, Sefershaev in the second period added four more points to himself with one move.

The 23-year-old has added the title of European champion to last year's World Cup title.

A very similar path was made by Zhambolat Lokyaev, who also came to Warsaw as an unofficial world champion. For the representative of the non-Olympic category up to 63 kg, the most difficult fight was also the semifinal. Lokyaev was devastatingly inferior to the Georgian Leri Abuladze with a score of 0: 5. But after the opponent was punished with a point for passivity, the Russian was able to throw him twice on the carpet and score eight points at once. And in the final, Lokyaev defeated Azerbaijani Taleh Mammadov dryly, to whom he also did not give a single point at the last year's World Cup.

The next medal was won by Milad Alirzaev in the Olympic weight category up to 87 kg.

His path for gold was interrupted in the 1/8 finals, when he, leading with a score of 6: 0 with the Belarusian Kirill Maskevich, suddenly missed a technique that led to a carcass.

Fortunately, the Russian managed to get into the bronze medal tournament and try his luck in it.

Having won two more fights, including with the current vice-world champion Viktor Lorents from Hungary, Alirzaev reached the small final, where he met with the Danish Turpan Bisultanov.

The Russian lost the first period, but at the beginning of the second, he earned eight points at once with three moves, which was enough to win.

With this, he slightly rehabilitated himself for the recent failure in the European Olympic selection, where Alirzaev was unable to win the necessary quota for the national team.

Heavyweight Zurab Gedekhauri also won the bronze, which can be considered a great success for him.

The son of the 1987 world champion Guram Gedekhauri lost in the quarterfinals to the Georgian Jacob Kajai, but continued to fight for third place.

In the fight for the medal, the Russian met with the Lithuanian Romas Fridrikas and beat him at the expense of the parterre earned in the first period.

The only fighter of the Russian national team who was left without a medal was Abuyazid Mantsigov, which was a big surprise.

The reigning world champion in the weight category up to 72 gained five kilograms in the Olympic season and has already achieved his first success, becoming the champion of Russia.

He came to Warsaw as one of the favorites and won the first two matches with a difference of nine points, but then he was defeated in the same way by the age Ukrainian Dmitry Pyshkov.

Manzigov did not make it to the bronze medal tournament.

Third gold Orshush and three defeats in the finals

The day before, the results were summed up in the women's freestyle wrestling.

Russian girls won the team classification, but won medals and won fewer victories than men.

The national team won seven awards, of which two were gold, three silver and two bronze.

The only victory in the Olympic disciplines was won by Olga Khoroshavtseva, who won a year ago in the weight category up to 55 kg, but this season she dropped two kilograms to be able to travel to Tokyo.

In the new category, the Krasnoyarsk athlete immediately began to dominate.

She won one match on the carcass, and in the next two she did not give her opponents a single point.

But in order to perform at the Olympics in the status of European champion, Khoroshavtseva will still need to win a ticket for the national team in weight up to 53 kg at the final qualifying tournament.

The second gold for Russia was won by Stalvira Orshush in the category up to 55 kg.

Her final fight with the hostess of the tournament, Roxana Zasina, fell on the athlete's 28th birthday.

The fight turned out to be very stubborn, and the Russian woman won with a score of 2: 2 only due to the last action.

Orshush became a three-time European champion.

The fight in the heaviest category up to 76 kg was also tense, where Olympic champion Natalya Vorobyova and Estonian Epp Mäe competed.

None of the athletes did not take active action, but Mäe received a point for passiveness after the Russian, and in the end it was she who became the winner, winning the first gold for Estonia in the fight since 1939.

Khanum Veliyeva, who defended the title of European champion, also received silver in the Olympic weight up to 68 kg. In the final, she was opposed by the Frenchwoman Cumba Larroc, who, at the age of 22, twice became the medalist of the World Championship. The two athletes were supposed to recently meet in the final of the European Olympic qualification, but then the Russian woman refused to fight due to injury. Larroc won the first period with a score of 3: 0, after which Veliyeva was able to win back two points, but she never won another point needed to win. Third silver went to Veronica Chumikova in the weight category up to 59 kg. She met with the obvious favorite Bilyana Dudova from Bulgaria, who, after defeating the Russian woman with a score of 5: 1, became a four-time European champion.

In the lightest category up to 50 kg, Russian Yekaterina Poleshchuk was not lucky in the quarterfinals to meet with the representative of Azerbaijan Maria Stadnik. The former Ukrainian athlete, who has not lost at the European Championships since 2008, defeated her rival with a score of 11: 0 and later won her eighth gold in the tournament. Poleshchuk after that could only fight for bronze with Ukrainian Oksana Livach. In their duel, one athlete led, then another, but in the end the Russian woman won with a score of 10: 9. Another bronze of the Russian national team was brought by Evgenia Zakharchenko in the non-Olympic weight category up to 72 kg.

In the overall medal standings of the European Championship, the Russian team has already become unattainable for all other countries. On Sunday, the last five finals in Greco-Roman wrestling will take place, and domestic athletes, having won ten victories over all these days, are already seven gold medals ahead of their closest competitors from Turkey.