Ilgar Mamedov: It makes no sense to go to the Olympics with veterans of the Battle of Kulikovo. The head coach of the Russian national team about the team's prospects at the World Championships What is the most popular type of fencing weapon?
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The head coach of the Russian fencing team, Azerbaijani Ilgar Mamedov, was awarded the state award of the Russian Federation.
Russian President Vladimir Putin presented the award to Mamedov on Wednesday in the Kremlin.
It is worth noting that in his opening speech, Putin noted that today was Ilgar Mamedov’s birthday and warmly congratulated him, which caused applause.
“You all fulfill your duty with dignity, do not rest on your laurels, constantly set new goals and new tasks for yourself,” Putin noted in his opening speech. “One of the participants in today’s ceremony, head coach of the Russian fencing team Ilgar Mamedov, also has and birthday. We cordially congratulate you on this holiday."
In response, Ilgar Mamedov gave a thank-you speech:
“Vladimir Vladimirovich, you know, victory is a complex event. This includes an athlete, a coach, a doctor, a massage therapist, a weapons master and many, many others. This is luck, luck, all this must come together in order to win, to win. I am grateful to our team. Athletes who were at the Olympics, who made a worthy contribution to the Russian team’s treasury for victory, are in the hall today. And the coaches are here. And this is a victory for the entire large team. And this high award from your hands... of course, for me "Today is a double holiday. Thank you for your congratulations on my birthday. I could only dream of such a day. Thank you so much!"
On Wednesday in the Kremlin, the president presented state awards to figures in science, culture, art, education, as well as cosmonauts and business executives. Among the awards are the title of Hero of Russia, the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, Alexander Nevsky, Courage, Honor and Friendship.
Among the laureates are the head of Gazprom Alexey Miller, the former head of Dagestan Ramazan Abdulatipov, singer Philip Kirkorov and others.
Ilgar Mamedov is a Soviet and Russian foil fencer of Azerbaijani origin, fencer. Baku.
Two-time Olympic champion in the team (1988, 1996), Honored Master of Sports of the USSR (1989), Honored Coach of the Russian Federation (2015), 1989 world champion in the team. Silver medalist at the 1995 World Championship. Four-time winner of the European Cup in 1995, 1996, 1998 and 2000. Multiple winner and champion of the USSR and Russia. Winner of the USSR (1987) and Russian (1994, 1998) Cups.
From December 2008 to December 2016 he worked on the Judicial Commission of the International Fencing Federation (FIE).
Since October 2012, he has been the head coach of the Russian fencing team.
For the first time in eleven years, at the 2013 World Championships in Budapest, the Russian team won 3 gold, 5 silver and 3 bronze, winning the team event, as well as the Nations Cup.
At the 2014 World Championships in Kazan (3-1-4), 2015 in Moscow (4-4-1), the Russian national team won 1st overall team place and the Nations Cup.
In 2016, the Russian national fencing team under the leadership of Mamedov took first place in the team competition at the World Team Championship in Brazil, the European Championship, and the Olympic Games in Brazil, winning 4 gold, 1 silver and 2 bronze. And this is not the entire list of Ilgar Mamedov’s merits.
Ilgar Mamedov: I asked the youths not to hand over money to them
The most successful coach of the Russian Olympic team, Ilgar Mamedov, gave grades on Teacher's Day.The most successful coach of the Russian Olympic team, Ilgar Mamedov, gave grades on Teacher's Day.
The head coach of the Russian national team and mentor of CSKA, 50-year-old reserve colonel Ilgar Mamedov lost a bet with his players. Terms of the bet: the coach will shave his head if his team wins two gold medals at the Rio Games. In the end, we won four. Without delaying the matter until the Moscow barber, Olympic champions Yana Yegoryan and Timur Safin shaved the coach right in Brazil.
The phenomenon of fencing teacher Ilgar Mamedov is that, having led the Russian national team after the Games in London four years ago, he achieved an unheard-of result even for the USSR national team. This year, Russian fencers celebrated victories in the team competition at all major competitions of the season.
"I AM NOT A DINOSAUR"
– Ilgar Yasharovich, how quickly did your hair grow back after the Brazilian execution?
- Fast. I even had to trim my temples.
– Since you allow your students to bully you like this, it means that you belong to them.
– My teacher, now deceased, two-time Olympic champion, six-time world champion Mark Petrovich Midler was an outstanding coach. He trained many Olympic champions. They never treated students as vassals. He was our senior comrade. A mentor. Teacher. Sweet character - no, this is not about him. He respected his students. He felt our strengths and weaknesses, knew who to raise his voice at at the right moment, and who to praise. And remembering the lessons of my teacher, I never used the scheme in my work: I am the boss - you are a fool. Although my eldest daughter says: Dad, everyone is afraid of you. But I'm not a dinosaur! Yes, I am strict when I see that the training of athletes is not going well, when discipline is lame and someone allows themselves to violate the sports regime. Then I get cruel.
– To what extent? If, for example, your athlete takes a sip...
– You need to know the time and place when you can take a sip. There were talented athletes in the Russian national team who had to be sent home and ended up finishing the sport. Imagine, the training process is going on, and someone cannot go to training after a day off, he lies in a comatose state in his room. Such sloppiness cannot be forgiven. Such misdeeds will metastasize, and they will devour the entire team. Therefore, after the third warning, I say to the violator: goodbye. Even if it is the winner of the European Championship and the medalist of the World Junior Championship. The so-called future of the Russian national team. This is not the future, this is the past. Another example of my “cruelty” - six months ago there was not even a smell of Olympic gold in the men’s team foil. After another failure of our foil fencers in Havana on March 14, 2016, I gathered the team of Arthur Akhmatkhuzin, Timur Safin, Dmitry Rigin, Alexey Cheremisinov, Dmitry Zherebchenko and said: do you like the way you fencing? No? Then listen to me. And he made changes by order. He returned Cheremisinov to coach Dmitry Shevchenko, whom the athlete left after the 2014 World Championships in Kazan. I took Timur Safin for myself.
– What is more involved in your work – sports, teaching or economic activity?
– We have to control all processes. To be a coach, teacher, part-time caretaker and psychotherapist. Some coaches and athletes need my systematic encouragement. For example, one foreign specialist, working in a foreign land, constantly needs communication and moral support. I often talk with him.
“ATHLETES ARE LIKE MY OWN CHILDREN”
– So, when your head was shaved, there was no fear that your authority would fall to the floor along with your hair?
– Athletes know perfectly well how I feel about them, and for this they respect me. They know what I do for them. I coach, help with employment, and solve housing issues. We gave the guys cars after the Rio Games, which means we all have to go together, in a line behind me, to set the alarms. So that the bonus money from the athletes does not disappear, I take it to Sberbank, now everyone has their own manager.
– What benefit do you get from such care?
– Athletes are like my own children. For example, Yana Yegoryan was raised without a father. The girl needs help. And not just now. After the Games in London, our trustee (Alisher Usmanov - Ed.) was presented with a list of athletes listing their problems. And he allocated serious funds to solve them. He decided how much for whom. The only thing is, I asked him not to give money to young athletes. After all, having received 500 thousand dollars in his hands, a young man can go crazy. Thanks to the trustee, apartments were purchased for young talents Yana Yegoryan, Timur Safin, and Violetta Kolobova. We bought apartments in the Kurkino area - next to the sports base in Novogorsk. We rented a house with furniture, so that there were forks and spoons, a washing machine, a dishwasher, everything was in place. So that the athletes just bring their belongings and do not waste time on arranging their housing.
HEROISM OF ARTHUR AKHMATKHUZIN
– Was there a lot of funding allocated?
– I’ll keep silent so as not to arouse envy. The amounts are serious, although the London Olympics were unsuccessful for Russian fencers. It is clear that fencing for our trustee is not a business, you cannot make money from it, it is for his soul. And for athletes and coaches, Olympic medals mean income. The investment four years ago has helped our talent reach the next level. The money, by the way, was allocated not only for apartments. The trustee transferred 150 thousand dollars to Arthur Akhmatkhuzin for an operation in New York.
– What kind of operation?
– At the World Championships in Budapest in 2013, Akhmatkhuzin won silver in the individual foil tournament. The big American Chamley-Watson Miles then won the gold. After the final, the trustee asked: what prevented Arthur from winning? I said: Akhmatkhuzin physically cannot carry out flash attacks, the so-called arrow attack, because he has joint necrosis from birth. The trustee gave the order to urgently look for a clinic for the operation, and said: I will pay for everything. In February 2014, Arthur had an artificial prosthesis inserted into his hip, and already at the 2015 World Championships in Moscow he became second in the team, and also took third place in the individual championship.
– There is an expression - driven horses are shot. Why did you and the trustee believe in Arthur?
- Because they don’t abandon their own people. There was a belief that Arthur had not said the last word in fencing. And here is the final of the Olympics in Rio. Team foil. We were burning for the French - 16:25, 25:30, 30:35, and then Arthur comes out and wins his duel - 10:3. We took the lead - 40:38, and brought the matter to victory. Arthur’s heroism is that he returned to big sport after surgery, and winning the Olympics in his case is just a flight into space!
ALISHER USMANOV'S CARE
– So, you are not only a teacher, but also a kind of director of a Russian fencing school, and its trustee Alisher Usmanov often calls you to the carpet?
“Tomorrow the trustee will read this interview and, as usual, will tell me that I thank him from the bottom of my heart.” And how can one not be grateful if he prolongs people’s sports lives free of charge and gives them hope for a good life after leaving sports. One more example. Arthur Akhmatkhuzin did not have his own apartment in Moscow. The trustee offered to help after the 2015 World Cup, but I said: no, let him go to the Olympics in Rio hungry, there will be more motivation.
After the Olympics, the head of Khimki, now the former one, handed Arthur the keys to the apartment, but not in Khimki, but on Skhodnya, and then only a service one. When the trustee found out about this, he told Akhmatkhuzin to choose an apartment in Novogorsk. The trustee rarely calls me on the carpet, because he deals with issues of a larger scale. But during the Olympic season we were in constant contact with him.
– Does Usmanov trust you completely?
– In matters of training athletes, the trustee gives advice, because he himself fencing in his youth. If I conduct psychotherapeutic conversations with coaches, then the trustee conducts them with me. He is wiser than me, so his life advice is priceless to me. If it weren’t for his trust, I wouldn’t be the head coach of the national team. I consider him my teacher. After the Olympics in Rio, he told me: you and I won this project. He understands perfectly well that there were many pitfalls along the way of implementing this project. Many spokes were put in the wheels of this project.
– Who dared?
– I can’t say everything.
– Is the project completed?
- I don't know yet. In November there are elections for the President of the International Fencing Federation, in February - elections for the President of the Russian Fencing Federation. In two or three months we will understand how fencing will develop in the country and in the world. There is a saying that no one is irreplaceable.
“There are more envious people”
– And if you are removed from the post of head coach of the Russian national team, will you be calm?
- Absolutely. After the successful performance of Russian fencers at the Rio Games, I don’t feel like I have complete carte blanche. There are more envious people, yes. Let them try to achieve better results.
– Not every honored teacher has the motivation to take on classroom leadership again after graduating a strong class filled with medal winners.
– Motivation appears when you see that you are needed. Athletes want to continue working with me, colleagues say: what kind of crazy person would want to become the head coach of the national team instead of you after Rio? I myself did not expect that we would go through the four-year period so well and defeat everyone.
“SIKA” FROM YANA EGORYAN
– How do you prepare the guys before important competitions?
– It is important not to overwhelm you with responsibility. The psychological factor often drowns out a person’s real sporting capabilities. I demand from athletes not to win, but to fight. We have long removed the word “should” in relation to victory from the lexicon. The mindset is this: you go out on the track and fight with dedication the way you were taught. And victories will come. There is lion adrenaline and rabbit adrenaline. Some people become stronger under stress, while others' knees buckle. It's always scary before the start.
– Fighting in boxing is understandable, hit it in the head and harder, but what does it mean to fight in fencing?
– If in boxing everything is decided by fists, then in fencing it is by blades. Fighting on the track means not backing away. Yes, you can fence as number two, but with aggression. I always tell athletes: have courage. In a duel between equal opponents, the advantage goes to the one who fences with courage. Take Yegoryan: when she yells on the track, all the lights are on after every blow, even if the fencing phrase was not technically executed perfectly. Her example is very illustrative. In Rio, in the semi-finals of the individual tournament, Yana competed with the strongest athlete in the world, Olga Kharlan. Before the break, the score was 8:7, and immediately after the rest, Yegoryan eluded her opponent’s attack and instantly struck from above. After which Yegoryan caught the courage and defeated her opponent -15:9. We call this kick "sika". A risky stunt, only the brave will dare to do it at the Olympics. By the way, about boxing. During preparations for the Olympics in Rio, he brought boxing gloves and paws to the foil team.
– Why else is this?
– To cultivate courage in the guys, so that they can, for example, protect a girl. My generation was more hooligan, we could stand up for ourselves. Today's fencers are different. Many of them have never hit villains in the face, but they themselves have never been hit in the head, and have only seen boxing gloves on TV. I think that boxing lessons have strengthened our foil fighters and made them more confident. The victory of the foil fencers in Rio in the team tournament is proof of this.
SECRET WEAPON – COURAGE
– How to catch courage correctly?
– You turn on the “ninja” option, and you begin to artificially wind yourself up, accompanying your actions with screams. In a state of courage, your peripheral vision turns on, and like in the movie “The Matrix,” you become invulnerable, making exemplary movements. Get the voice out of yourself - I advise students. The voice gives strength, speed, confidence.
– So this is the main secret of the success of Russian fencers in Rio. Did we win our medals by shouting?
– The Games in Rio showed that you can’t win a medal with technique and tactics alone. Look how many of the national team's first numbers dropped out of the race in the early stages. We only have saber fencer Alexey Yakimenko. But where is he, in terms of skill, and where is the Bulgarian Pancho Paskov, who defeated him in the 1/16 finals? Japanese foil fencer Yuki Ota, the 2015 world champion, lost to an unknown Brazilian, the great foil fencer Arianna Irigo is on fire against the Canadian. Why did they lose? Because they decided to win only through technology and tactics, and could not oppose anything to the courage of their opponents.
– How do you train courage in your students?
– I constantly give instructions: a couple of minutes before the fight, do five maximum lunges. Step-lunge, step-lunge, as if there is an opponent in front of you, and you want to pierce him right through. True, for four years at international competitions I have never stood at the track, and have never approached the podium, because I am a member of the judging commission of the International Fencing Federation (FIE). Judging is also an important part of my job. I would have been working by the path, perhaps long ago burned out from worries.
– Numerous Russian fans in the stands during international competitions – is this also a tradition for the courage of our fencers?
– Of course, our fans ignite courage in Russian athletes. At the Rio Games, 130 Russians in the stands performed this task during the fights between their compatriots.
– Why don't rivals use similar tactics?
– They don’t have a trustee like the Russian team.
HALL OF FAME
– Give characteristics to your students – the gold medalists who ended up on the “Roll of Honor” at the end of Rio.
– Yana Yegoryan is a young star who has become a star. Reckless. There probably weren’t any authorities in sports for her, and there aren’t. Recently I asked her: Yana, do you know why you won two golds in Rio? Because she was the hungriest of all.
– Is that why Yegoryan defeated Sophia the Great in the final of the Olympic saber tournament?
– If we talk philosophically, then yes. In technology and tactics, Velikaya is much stronger than Yegoryan. In addition, Sophia is more experienced, she has two Olympic cycles under her belt. But Yana is the queen of courage. Sonya the Great is a high-class fighter and leader. Having such a reliable fighter on the team is the dream of any national team coach. This Olympics was extremely difficult for the Great One. The thin one won. But the Great One is great because it can pull itself together at the most difficult moment. Like, for example, in the semi-finals of the saber team championship against the US team, when Sofia won her duel 6:0, providing a foundation for Yegoryan. If the Great One fences as a team, we are practically invincible.
Foil thrower Inna Deriglazova is the most hardworking athlete in the world. A week before the Games, 70 kilometers from Rio in Portobello, where we were preparing for the Olympics, I began to raise my voice at Inna and her coach Ildar Mavlyutov, so that they would reduce the load. Sometimes fencing kills fencing. This happens when a person is fixated on the training process, and before an important start it is necessary to “catch fresh” - reduce the load.
WHO IS ON MATERNITY, WHO IS ON PENSION
– Will there be new names in the Russian team for the next Olympics in Tokyo?
- Certainly. The command will be updated. Someone will need to retire. Someone will go on maternity leave.
– You talk about it so calmly.
- So what to do? Girls need to give birth. In addition, if a person has gone through two Olympic training cycles, his psyche is shaken. A damaged psyche blocks coordination. However, if an athlete consistently shows high results, what questions might there be for him? For example, Sofya Velikaya is 31 years old, but she is one of the leaders in the world rankings. You cannot bring veterans to Tokyo whose results have not been encouraging for a long time. After the Moscow World Championship, by the way, I had to remove passengers from the team. Complaints poured in against me. But history has shown that I was right. In addition, everyone wants to see a strong Russian team at the Olympics.
"THE ARMY DISCIPLINES"
– Do you understand that you managed to change public consciousness? Many were sure that only in the USSR could Russian athletes dominate in one sport or another.
– If there is no result, people begin to invent reasons. And I can, but you can’t fool yourself. If you work honestly and correctly, if you feel the support of your colleagues, you can move mountains. It is important to note that 80 percent of the Russian team’s athletes are CSKA fencers. This circumstance, military service, disciplines athletes and forces them to honor the traditions of Soviet sports. Sophia the Great - captain of the Russian Army, Alexey Cheremisinov - senior lieutenant, Arthur Akhmatkhuzin - lieutenant. The head of CSKA, Colonel Mikhail Baryshev, personally petitioned for Akhmatkhuzin to be awarded the officer rank after the athlete’s heroic performance in Rio. Such things inspire me as an officer. I was in the army club for 30 years and 1 month, rose to the rank of colonel, and after the Universiade in Kazan in 2013, I personally thanked Vladimir Putin when, on his order, the conscription of young athletes to the CSKA sports companies was resumed.
SECRET OF SUCCESS
– And yet, how can you achieve such success in four years?
– We attracted the best domestic specialists to work in the Russian team. Foreign coaches were invited. Stefano Cerioni (foil), Christian Bauer (saber), Angelo Matzoni (épée) shared their experience. There was competition in the coaching staff. Foreigners believed that they were the best specialists in the world, but ours thought differently. We freed the coaches from administrative work, which fell on the shoulders of the three team leaders. Three bosses: Kazbek Karaev, Andrey Butakov, Ivan Skornevsky - know their job. We strengthened the medical staff, created a database - a video file on our opponents. This success of Russian fencers is a complex event. In which not only athletes and coaches took part, but also the Russian Fencing Federation, the ROC, the Ministry of Sports, doctors, massage therapists, and videographers. The victory came thanks to the support of caring people who have supported our team morally and financially all these years. Everyone understands that without the fantastic support of our trustee, Russian fencing would not have had such success.
SYLLABUS
– The vacation is over. How do you plan your working day?
– On October 1, the report of the new four-year Olympic cycle began. My working day starts at 8 am and yesterday, for example, I returned home from the Krugloye Lake base at 11 pm. Tomorrow from morning until lunch I will be at the base in Novogorsk, and at 14.00 I will go to Krugloye again. The day after tomorrow I’m leaving for training camp in Sochi, which will last until October 15th. Then – the annual coaching council of the Russian Fencing Federation, we will outline plans and move forward. To be a good teacher you need a good curriculum.
PRIVATE BUSSINESS
Ilgar MAMEDOV
Rapierist. Honored Master of Sports of the USSR. Honored Trainer of Russia. Participant in 4 Olympics (1988, 1992, 1996, 2000). Olympic champion in 1988 and 1996 in the team championship in foil fencing. World champion 1989. Winner of the European Cup 1995, 1996, 1998, 2000. Repeated champion of Russia and the USSR. He played for CSKA (Moscow). Reserve Colonel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
He graduated from the Azerbaijan State Institute of Physical Culture in 1987 and the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2008.
Since October 2012, he has been the head coach of the Russian fencing team. Currently a member of the refereeing commission of the International Fencing Federation (FIE), a member of the coaching council of the Russian Fencing Federation (RFF). At the Rio 2016 Games, Mamedov's students Timur Safin and Artur Akhmatkhuzin won gold in the team foil competition, and Safin added bronze to this award in the individual competition.
Ilgar Mamedov's wife, Elena Zhemaeva, is also a fencer - two-time world and European champion, winner of the World Cup. He has two daughters, Milena and Ayla.
AWARD LIST
RUSSIAN TRIUMPHERS OF RIO 2016
Under the leadership of the head coach of the national team, Ilgar Mamedov, the Russians won four golds, a silver and two bronzes at the Rio Games. Yana Yegoryan won two gold medals in the individual and team championships. In the final of the team competition, saber fencers - Sofia Velikaya, Yana Yegoryan and Yulia Gavrilova - defeated the Ukrainian team - 45:30.
In the team foil tournament, Alexey Cheremisinov - Timur Safin - Arthur Akhmatkhuzin won a gold medal for Russia 20 years after a similar triumph for their compatriots. After five fights (out of nine) in the final match with the French team, our foil team lost with a score of 16-25, but managed to achieve an impressive victory - 45-41.
Inna Deriglazova, having defeated the Italian Elisa di Francisca in the final of the foil tournament, won the gold medal. Moreover, domestic athletes did not take medals in an individual tournament after the Games in Mexico City 1968.
The bronze medal in Rio was won by Timur Safin (personal foil), the team of Russian epee fencers: Tatyana Logunova, Violetta Kolobova and Lyubov Shutova.
BY THE WAY
At the 2012 Olympic Games in London, the Russian team won two silver and one bronze.
ACCLAIMING LIST
The Russian Fencing Federation is a model of work; this sport in Russia has made a huge leap over the past Olympic cycle. I think the rest of our sports federations need to follow their example (ROC President Alexander Zhukov).
(1965-11-15 ) , Baku) - Soviet and Russian foil fencer of Azerbaijani origin, colonel of the Russian Armed Forces, head coach of the Russian fencing team.Two-time Olympic champion in the team (,), Honored Master of Sports of the USSR (1989), Honored Coach of the Russian Federation (2015), 1989 World Champion in the team. Silver medalist at the 1995 World Championship. Four-time winner of the European Cup in 1995, 1996, 1998 and 2000. Multiple winner and champion of the USSR and Russia. Winner of the USSR (1987) and Russian (1994, 1998) Cups.
Encyclopedic YouTube
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✪ Ilgar Mamedov - head coach of Sat. Russian fencing is visiting Top Sport. 06.06.2018
✪ Ilgar Mamedov about the team’s performance at the World Cup
✪ Yegoryan and Safin shaved their head coach of the Russian fencing team, Ilgar Mamedov
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Life and sports career
He graduated from the Azerbaijan State Institute of Physical Culture in 1987 and the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2008.
He played for CSKA (Moscow). Reserve Colonel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
Honored Master of Sports of the USSR. Honored Trainer of Russia. Participant in 4 Olympics (1988, 1992, 1996, 2000). Olympic champion in 1988 and 1996 in the team championship in foil fencing. World champion 1989. Winner of the European Cup 1995, 1996, 1998, 2000. Repeated champion of Russia and the USSR.
From December 2008 to December 2016 he worked on the Judicial Commission of the International Fencing Federation (FIE).
Since October 2012, he has been the head coach of the Russian fencing team.
For the first time in eleven years, at the 2013 World Championships in Budapest, the Russian team won 3 gold, 5 silver and 3 bronze, winning the team event, as well as the Nations Cup. At the 2014 World Championships in Kazan (3-1-4), 2015 in Moscow (4-4-1), the Russian national team won 1st overall team place and the Nations Cup.
Personal student Artur Akhmatkhuzin won silver in individual competitions at the 2013 World Championships, and won bronze in the individual competition and silver in the team competition at the 2015 World Championships.
In 2016, the Russian national team under the leadership of Mamedov I.Ya. took first place in the team competition at the following official competitions: 1. European Championship among juniors and cadets, Novi Sad (Serbia), February 2016 2. World Championship among juniors and cadets, Bourges (France), April 2016 3. World Team Championship, Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), April 2016 4. European Championship among athletes under 24 years old, Plovdiv (Bulgaria), May 2016 5. European Championship, Torun (Poland), June 2016. Following the results of the Olympic Games, the Russian national team took first place as a team at the 2016 Summer Olympic Games, Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), winning 4 gold, 1 silver and 2 bronze . At the games in Rio 2016, students of Mamedov I.Ya. Safin Timur won the bronze medal in the individual competition and won the gold medal in the team competition. Akhmatkhuzin Arthur won a gold medal in the team competition.
Family
Ilgar Mamedov's wife Elena Zhemayeva is also a fencer - two-time world and European champion, World Cup winner, and represented Azerbaijan at the 2004 Olympics. In 1997, Ilgar and Elena had a daughter, Milena. In 2005, Ayla was born.
Awards and titles:
Honored Master of Sports of the USSR, Order of the Chairman of the Committee on Physical Culture and Sports under the Council of Ministers of the USSR dated March 29, 1989;
Honored Coach of Russia, Order of the Minister of Sports of the Russian Federation dated October 28, 2015 #146 NG;
Gratitude from the President of the Russian Federation dated 01/06/1997 #4-рп - “For high sporting achievements at the XXVI Summer Olympic Games 1996 in Atlanta (USA);
Certificate of Honor from the President of the Russian Federation dated 01/23/2014 #14-rp - “For services to the development of physical culture and sports, high sporting achievements at the XXVII World Summer Universiade 2013 in Kazan;
The victories of Russian fencers in recent years are associated with the name of Ilgar Mamedov. Today, the head coach announces a large-scale “restructuring” of the national team: the generational change should end along with the Olympic cycle and lead to another success in Tokyo 2020.
website/Sergey Bulkin
Ilgar Yasharovich, how do you assess the team’s performance at the World Championships in Leipzig, given that for the first time in several years Russia was left without first place in the overall medal standings?
For the past 4 years we have only won first places. Everyone somehow got used to this and no longer remembers that before that there were 11 years of defeats. Winning, of course, is prestigious, but it cannot last forever. Given the change of generations, winning 2nd overall team place is certainly a good performance. After all, we must take into account that our “saber” practically did not participate in the championship, so to speak, “passed by.”
Today, the problem of our team is not in the World Cup 2017, but in preparation for Tokyo 2020. The fight for licenses will begin only in 2019, and we have a small gap in preparation.
website/Sergey Bulkin
What happened to our saber fencers in Germany? Have you already worked on the bugs?
Each defeat is a subject for analysis. The saber match at the championship was, of course, a disaster. This is due to the fact that the situation in the team is not entirely normal: the athletes are divided into “us” and “strangers,” which really interferes with the process. We are trying to somehow explain to the saber coach (Christian) Bauer that this is a single national team of the country and this approach is unacceptable. Normal, healthy competition should be encouraged.
The World Championship showed that, having such names in the composition, our team took only 8th place. In Leipzig, even the return of the older Alexey Yakimenko to the national team did not help, although he gave results at the European Championships in Tbilisi. After the championship, Alexey left the national team and is unlikely to return. Now in saber we have only two real contenders for the next Olympic Games - Kamil Ibragimov and Dmitry Danilenko. Both of them are young and promising, but we need more athletes.
website/Sergey Bulkin
How did the athletes approach the World Cup stages that will be held in October? Who are you betting on?
This is the first start of the season, so it’s difficult to say in advance. 12 girls and 12 guys are leaving - well, how can you guess? At the World Championships they relied on Safin because the athlete showed good results during the season - he was in the top three at all tournaments. And Zherebchik became the world champion. That’s why our sport is interesting because of its unpredictability.
website/Sergey Bulkin
What problems does the national team have now and how to approach the Olympics correctly?
Now we are still in a historical period - a change of generations. Of the men, some finished performing, some did not return due to injury, some of the women went on maternity leave, and so on. Going to the Olympics with “veterans of the Battle of Kulikovo” makes no sense.
Experienced athletes who have been on the national team for more than 8 years have some mental problems: scientific studies have shown that two Olympic cycles in a row greatly weaken the psyche of athletes. It’s worth adding to this that after 30, speed, reaction, speed of decision-making, and so on, drop. The ideal option is when the team has a mixture of experience and youth: a couple of athletes 20–22 years old and a couple under 30 years old. But such a balance cannot be achieved artificially. Therefore, we are trying to somehow balance, and updating the lineup in this case is a necessary measure.
We do not have the Italian national team, which has a long bench of quality athletes. We have much fewer professional fencing people. Our sport is cultivated in only 3-4 regions of Russia. Therefore, we take not by quantity, but by talent. That is, we saw talent and are starting to work with it separately. For example, last year I noticed foil player Kirill Borodachev and started working with him: we were trying out a new repertoire, new techniques. A year has passed, and we see the results - 17-year-old Kirill is already second at the European Championship.
website/Sergey Bulkin
For what reasons are we not developing children's fencing?
Because the system of children's sports schools has been destroyed. If earlier there were many clubs, DSOs and departments, now there is only one club left - CSKA. Moreover, CSKA used to be only in Moscow, and in other cities SKA, and now they are all “Central”, even in Novosibirsk. A little strange, you will agree. “Dynamo” and trade union clubs practically do not work on fencing at all and are fixated on commercial sports. Everything is somehow not systematic. As an example, I’ll cite Italy, which has 200 sports clubs and more than 120 thousand fencers. In addition to sports schools, children need to participate in various camps, travel to competitions, and they must do all this at their own expense. Unfortunately, children's sports in our country are not paid.
For example, my daughter Ayla: she is 12 and a promising foil fighter. I paid 40 thousand rubles so that she could participate in the training camp in Kazan. And she came from there with full confidence in her own abilities, because in 17 days she had as many fights as in the whole year at her sports school in Khimki. And how many talented children do not have the opportunity to pay such fees?! That is, if the parents have money, then the child will progress, and if not, then sorry. In the USA, the approach to children's sports is the same, but, excuse me, parents have a completely different income there.
The situation is slightly brightened up by the support of the Fencing Federation, which has already created and paid for five regional centers. For example, thanks to the Southern Regional Center in Rostov, sections were opened in Sochi, Krasnodar, and Pyatigorsk. But in order to get quality athletes from there, decades must pass, and we need the result today.
website/Sergey Bulkin
How are your new relations with the Russian Fencing Federation (RFF) developing? After all, I remember that at the beginning of your career in the national team they were not very warm?
Then there was a banal problem between the older and younger generations. Then I was 37 years old and, in fact, no one in the Federation needed me. In the leadership, everyone there occupied several chairs and clung to them tightly - they simply did not need competition, and, accordingly, no one wanted to help me. A conflict ensued. Then the head of the FFR took my side. I had to go through a lot, I also went into “honorary exile” at the FIE (International Fencing Federation), where I was a member of the panel of judges. During this time, he even managed to get a second education at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
Time itself put everything in its place. The Federation President believed in me again and saw where the truth was. But the truth is that we need to open doors for young people. There should also be a generational change in the coaching staff. Now I’m trying to get athletes who finish their competitions to become coaches. We are bringing Alexey Yakimenko, Artyom Sedov, Alexey Tikhomirov, and Tatyana Logunova into this. But people are different, and, for example, Nikolai Kovalev chose the US national team over our team, where he was immediately given the position of senior coach of the national saber teams. The quality of our athletes is highly valued in the West. Therefore, the more former athletes remain on the team, the better for it. There is no need to be afraid that someone will trick you. And I, too, will not be on the team forever - tomorrow a younger, more energetic person, with some new vision, may come, and I will only be glad. Then I will be engaged in a narrower specialization - I won’t be leading for the rest of my life.
website/Sergey Bulkin
After the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Russian fencers also wanted to be convicted of doping. How was that problem with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) resolved?
We didn't have any problems with WADA. It’s just that the “McLaren list” automatically brought our fencers under suspicion: everyone who participated in the European U23 Championships in Tbilisi in 2014 was on this list. Not even the main members of the team were there. We learned about the list after the Olympics; the Federation hired good lawyers who prepared the necessary documents and sent them to WADA. Naturally, they immediately removed all suspicions from us, and even gave us a special document that there were no complaints against the Russian fencers. And during the Olympics, it was, of course, unpleasant to follow the disqualifications of Russian athletes. But we were calm, because we knew that we did not use any drugs.
website/Sergey Bulkin
During the Olympics, the story became famous throughout the country when Yana Yegoryan won the bet and cut your hair bald. What was the message from this story? Do you single out Yana Yegoryan among other athletes?
In this matter, it was important to show that even at the Olympics, in a tense environment for the national team, you can find a place for humor. This is necessary for morale. Moreover, with a successful performance, you can fool around with the coach.
I have good relationships with all my players - there shouldn’t be “insiders” and “strangers” in the national team. I have a good relationship with Yana, but I can also be very strict with her. She missed the Russian Championships in April of this year without permission, for which she received a good beating. Last year, I allowed both her and Sofya Velikaya to miss the Russian Championship, because it was held in Omsk and due to difficult flights, preparations for the Olympics could be disrupted. But this year there were no prerequisites for the absence of leading athletes at the Russian Championship. And the fact that she began to refer to Christian Bauer does not matter to me. Therefore the first warning.
Athletes should not be allowed to sit on their heads, no matter how titled they may be, otherwise there will simply be no point in having coaches. The fact that Yana Yegoryan became an Olympic champion does not mean that everything is allowed to her - the country expects new results from her.
website/Sergey Bulkin
How can you plan new results if you have already reached the highest point of sports glory - the title of Olympic champion? As a two-time Olympic champion, tell us from your experience.
People are different. For example, I competed calmly until I was 35 years old and after the first Olympics I confidently went through the Olympic cycle to the second and so on. But Pavlovich, who was on the same team with me in Atlanta-96, after the Olympic gold simply served his number. Motivation is also of great importance. After the first medal, you need to think not about your greatness, but about increasing what you have achieved. Well, how can a young athlete accumulate fat at the age of 25?! We have to work and work again, and from my students I expect the same attitude towards what they love.
website/Sergey Bulkin
For domestic sports, Mamedov Ilgar Yashar ogly is a legendary figure. He is a two-time Olympic champion in foil fencing, a world champion and a multiple winner of the European Cup. Currently, the famous athlete is the coach of the Russian fencing team. We will talk about his life and career in the article.
Biography
The future champion Ilgar Mamedov was born on November 15, 1965 in the Azerbaijani capital. As a child, he read The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo. The boy liked everything that was connected with the era of those times: noble knights, swords and duels. Ilgar's father is a fencer, and his son followed in his footsteps. But not right away: at first he became interested in music and played the piano from the age of five to eleven. And he started his sports career with the boxing section, but later changed the type under the influence of his dad. By the way, Ilgar’s two brothers are also fencers, so the “three musketeers” grew up in the family. So that the boys did not have to meet on the path, the father came up with one trick: he invited the eldest son to fencing with swords, the middle one with rapiers, and the youngest son with sabers.
In 1987, Ilgar Mamedov graduated from the Institute of Physical Culture in Baku. In 2008, he received a second higher education at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
Sports career
Since the late 1980s, the young athlete began playing for CSKA Moscow, his personal trainer was Mark Midler. In 1988, fencer Ilgar Mamedov went to his first Olympics in Seoul, Korea. He was still an inexperienced rapier player, so they didn’t have much hope for him. However, it was at these Games that the fencer as part of the USSR national team won his first gold medal. A year later, the Soviet team repeated its success at the world championship in Denver, America.
At the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, Ilgar Mamedov and his team partners met with failure: they had to be content with only fifth place. In 1995, the fencer became the winner of the European Cup and the silver medalist of the world championship in team foil. He subsequently won the European Cup three more times: in 1996, 1998 and 2000.
At the 1996 Games, held in Atlanta, Ilgar Mamedov won the second Olympic gold in his life. In 2000, the foil fighter went to Sydney, Australia for his last Olympics. At that time he was 34 years old - a respectable age for a fencer. The athlete hoped to win and end his sporting career on a high note, but this failed: he was left without medals.
Further work
At the end of his career, Ilgar Mamedov left for the USA and became the coach of a student team at a university in Ohio. He spent a year and a half overseas and missed Russia very much. In 2001, he returned to Moscow to participate in the celebration dedicated to the 300th anniversary of Russian fencing. At the banquet, the Olympic champion was introduced to the president of the Russian federation in this sport, and he promised to find Mamedov a good job in Russia.
Upon returning from the USA, the former rapierist worked at the FFR, from 2008 to 2016. was a member of the Judicial Commission of the FIE - International Fencing Federation.
In October 2012, Ilgar Mamedov was appointed head coach of the Russian fencing team. He currently holds this position.
As a coach
Before Mamedov headed the national team, our team had not won world championships for eleven years in a row. And with his arrival, three victories immediately followed in the team event at the World Championships in 2013, 2014 and 2015, where our fencers won 11, 8 and 9 medals, respectively.
In 2016, the Russian national team under the leadership of Ildar Mamedov took first place as a team at the European Championship, World Championship and Olympic Games. In Rio de Janeiro, Russian fencers won 7 medals, 4 of which were gold.
At the post-Olympic world championship in Leipzig, Germany in 2017, our team became second in the medal standings, winning three golds and three bronzes. Russian fencers finished the 2018 World Championships less successfully: overall team fifth place and seven medals, of which only one was gold.
Awards and titles
Ilgar Mamedov is an Honored Master of Sports of the USSR and an Honored Trainer of Russia. In 1997, he received gratitude from the President of the Russian Federation for his achievements at the Olympics in Atlanta. In 2014, he was awarded a presidential certificate for services to the development of sports and achievements at the Universiade in Kazan.
The famous athlete also has medals “For Labor Valor” and “For Services to the Fatherland.” In 2017, he received the Order of Honor for the successful preparation of fencers for the Olympics in Brazil.
Family
Ilgar Mamedov is married and has two daughters. His wife, Elena Zhemaeva, is also a fencer; she is a two-time European and world champion, winner of the World Cup, participant of the 2004 Olympic Games as a member of the Azerbaijani national team.
The eldest daughter, Milena, was born in 1997. As a child, she practiced fencing, but then lost interest in the sport and focused on her studies. Now the girl is studying at Peoples' Friendship University. The youngest daughter, Ayla, was born in 2005. She also became interested in sports foil, loves this sport very much, trains hard and performs successfully in competitions.
In September 2018, Ilgar Mamedov opened his Fencing Center in Novogorsk. This is a multifunctional complex built according to all new international standards.
In the main hall of the center there are eighteen fencing tracks, equipped with modern fencing devices that record hits. The complex plans to host competitions at various levels: from regional to international. Now Russian fencers have their own home, and new champions will undoubtedly grow up in it.
