On the 11th June 2011 "Open Championships in the Olympic Picnic" were held for the fifth time. Though this year's edition of the competition interfered Hands of Stone tournament, which took place the same day in this Błonia, 34 competitors from the Polish armwrestling arena came to Kepa Potocka to Warsaw anyway. A special guest of this year's picnic was Marcin Lachowicz, who led the competition.

Accompanied by sunny weather and a perfect atmosphere of the Olympic picnic athletes from Lublin, Tomaszów Mazowiecki, Wegrów, Sieradz, and many other basins of the Polish armwrestling competed with each other. Besides the main event at a professional table, all participants of the picnic could compete either in competition between each other or with Polish Armwrestling Champions. It was not forgotten of the youngest age group - children who could try on at a specially prepared, smaller armwrestling table.

The main competition took place in 9 weight classes. From the very beginning of the struggles it was clear that players are very highly motivated and none of them came to Warsaw to give up easily.

The competition began with the junior class, which was dominated by young players from Lublin, in particular, fifteen-year old student of Gymnasium No. 2 in Lublin Bartłomiej Bielecki. This competitor won both the junior and seniors up to 78 kg classes. It should be added that juniors from the Gymnasium No. 2 in Lublin captured seven medals and ranked first in team classification.

After junior rivalry time for seniors came.

 In senior up to 63kg class among six competing players the decisive victory was achieved by Stanisław Smereka.

For the next 78 kg class of men 9 players applied. After very stiff fights already mentioned Bartłomiej Bielecki  from Lublin ranked first, just behind him was Adrian Możdżeń, who in his way to the cup-finals, in a thrilling battle defeated a player from the audience - Marcin Czechowski.

In the next 95 kg class, we could see many titled players from the Polish armwrestling arena, including: Grzegorz Lasota from Złoty Niedźwiedź Bydgoszcz and Dawid Izbiński from  SDS Tomaszów Mazowiecki. The strongest competitor that day was Grzegorz Lasota , who easily won all his fights, winning first place of this weight category.  The performance of David Izbiński, also  deserves special attention. His fights were often rewarded with applause. However, in the cup-final he was defeated by a more experienced colleague from Bydgoszcz. The third accounted for Przemysław Gómułka.

The last category of the tournament was +95 kg men class in which 10 players signed up to compete. Here, the best one was an experienced Patryk Szymaniak, who in the final fight did not give any chance to the revelation of these competitions - Marcin Dudek.

Of course, as befits the form of a picnic competitions were played in a friendly atmosphere, and tournament fights often raised a great interest among the audience. Of course, adrenaline accompanying the main struggle was infectious to the observers, who often tried thier hands at a professional table.

Scores are accessible in CHAMPIONSHIPS section of our website.

Paweł Podlewski