We are doing our best...

As you all probably know we are trying to popularize Kettlebell Lifting in Latvia and abroad. Last week we were organizing competitions for college students. We had four events in different cities - Riga, Daugavpils, Saldus and Malpils. So here is the story...

We had two competitions on Tuesday. One was in Daugavpils and another in Riga (which is about 350km apart). So some people went to Daugavpils to organize the event there and others stayed in Riga. I was among those who stayed. This day we had about 40 participants in Riga and 80 in Daugavpils. As I already said, these competitions were for college students, which means that all the participants were under 20y.o. And there were no girls. I have no idea were did they find so many boys, who were ready to lift weights, but I was happy to see that happening. We decided to have the same weight categories as we usually have for young men (53kg, 58kg, 63kg, 68kg, 73kg, 78kg, 85kg and over 85kg). The first three categories lifted 16kg KBs, but the rest worked with 24kg. I thought they wouldn't be able to lift them at all, but I was wrong. Surprisingly enough there were some very talented boys. The most surprising of all days was the guy, who lifted 16kg KBs and made 161 jerk and 194 snatches. We all were in shock (in a good way).

I remember the last day... It felt like we just came to work, did our job and left :) It wasn't so special for us, because it was 3rd competition in a row, but it was still very interesting and full of emotions. To be honest, our judges became very strict in the end of the week. They were counting any rep on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Thursday was different. Referees acted as they were jugging Masters of Sport :) They were not counting half of the reps and were asking for a perfect technique. But I think it was even better for the boys, because they could learn from the very beginning that referees are strict and you have to have a good technique to get a good result.
This day was also different from others, because it was the only day when we decided to show guys the right way of lifting before the competition. And not only just show them what is jerk and snatch, but do it in a most shocking way - send out a girl to perform the technique :) And guess who was the girl :) Nobody expected that a little secretary can go out and lift 16kg KB without even warming up, in a jeans and snow boots :)

Another thing that we did to make the events more interesting is the relay race. Guys didn't know that there is such a thing as a race in the kettlebell lifting. So we described them the rules and offered to try. We had 3-5 teams in every competition. And boys really enjoyed it. They said it was the best part of the competition :) You have to be there to understand the feeling... the place was full of emotions... And we as organizers enjoyed it, too.

We gave out our contacts and invited guys to participate in Latvian Cup. Some of them seemed very interested. And it gave us a hope to have more people in our sport.