I immediately imagined the world championships in fencing, let’s say the epee event. Two days. On the first day each competitor holds their epee in the left hand, and on the other day in the right hand. Then the results are summed up and the winners are announced. Or … a car rally. On the first day each driver drives a European car, whereas on the other day they change to an English car with the wheel on the right side. The shot put is yet another good example, once with the left hand, once with the right hand! The long jump, on the first day takeoff on the left foot, and on the right one on the second day. It’s like in Vladimir Vysotsky’s (1938-1980), song a Russian author, poet and singer. He wrote a lot about the sport, including “The song about the high jumper”. The thing is that the main character of the song took off on the right foot unlike the rest of the competitors and because of that he was constantly dressed down by his coach. Of course it was a clear political allusion to the life in the former USSR.

But coming back to the matter of one or two hands.

It’s not a good idea to introduce such a “biathlon” into a professional sport. I know that that’s the case with Russian national championships. But to me it’s no good.

However, I can understand why someone came up with such ideas and why they sometimes attract supporters.

It’s all about the “versatile physical development”. It is an argument, but not in the case of a professional sport on a championship level.

For teenagers – yes!

In serious competition – no!

Anyway, please notice how illusory is the “forced” versatility. Most competitors have one hand “better” than the other. Yet they do lots of exercises which develop the whole muscular apparatus not only for safety or aesthetic reasons, but also because the muscles develop “together”. An extreme example of this phenomenon is muscle strength gain in the left limb while training just the right limb. Each competitor cares about versatility, just not to lose contact with the professional sport, in case of an injury to the area of the wrist, shoulder, or elbow.

Don’t take my criticism to heart. It is the way it is, once the Russian competitions were designed like that and for sure, the rules won’t change soon. Fortunately, no one has monopoly on that and PAL certainly is not going to work this way.

Looking forward to your opinions. Best regards!

PeSzy