The main event of the year in the world of armwrestling – The World Cup – is just around the corner. Nemiroff World Cup is the embodiment of the best technology, organization and the highest level of fighters. Looking at the past, every fan of armwrestling is bound to say that there is no greater event than Nemiroff.

Igor, what does Nemiroff 2013 have in store for us, how will it differ from previous editions?

We dictate trends in this sport. Let’s look at the past. In 2004 we placed sponsor logos on a backdrop. You can say that’s nothing new, but no previous armwrestling tournament even had a backdrop like this. Only after the 2004 event have other federations adapted this solution.

In 2005, for the first time we had a television broadcast on Polsat Sport. This was a huge step for promotion and popularization of armwrestling.

In 2007 we have first introduced left-hand wrestling. Back then an undisputed champion was Andrey Pushkar.

In 2009, after two days of broadcast, we reached 85 thousand viewers.

In 2010 the number of online viewings increased dramatically. On the first day, the Internet connection slowed down drastically, because the number of viewers exceeded the predefined bandwidth. The counter stuck at 150 thousand viewers. Nobody expected that.

In 2011 you could only watch Nemiroff online at a fee. The fee wasn’t small, but still we had a large audience. Thanks to the profits from pay-per-view we could cover some organizational costs of the Nemiroff World Cup. To this day the Nemiroff is not a very profitable event, that’s why we are always on the lookout for sponsors. On average it costs 30 – 50 000 $ to organize the Cup.

In 2012 TV stations reached out to us to actually buy the rights to transmission of the Cup. The biggest of them all was "Боец ", with quite a wide range of signal. Back then we thought that was the pinnacle of our success. 2013 showed we were wrong. This year is an absolute breakthrough. A new era is dawning for armwrestling and the Nemiroff Cup especially. For the first time we’re going to be broadcast live on Eurosport 2. This means a live feed, in 54 countries and 17 languages! Each day will get 2 hours transmission, semifinals and finals. This is a huge organizational responsibility, especially the technical side – the quality of sound, picture and signal.

This year we will also be using a new screen.

It’s an actual screen, not canvas like in the past, 13,5 meters long and 3,8 meters high. This will outdo even last year by far. We’ll have a live performance by Chassis, this is going to be something!

Some say that the Nemiroff World Cup 2013 isn’t going to be that spectacular, because of the favorite – Denis Cyplenkov. Many think he is undefeated, so there will be no contest in the open category. What do you think?

In 2011 everybody said the same, but in the left-hand category it was Pushkar who won. This year it’s a bit different. Denis and Andrey will compete, but they’ll be joined by Dave Chaffey. He’s USA’s most powerful armwrestler. Those who think Michael Todd the strongest, are much mistaken. It’s going to be very interesting to watch Dave perform in Nemiroff.

It will also be very interesting to watch each weight category, especially the 95kg, as there are some powerful rivals there. I regret that we will not see Liliev and Babayev, the show would be even more spectacular had they entered. There are some contestants who haven’t had great success in Nemiroff so far, but the expectations are high this year for them, like Eugene Prudnyk. He beat Babayev in European Cup, hence the attention.

I wouldn’t say that open is going to be boring. Denis will have huge competition in left hand, not so much in right hand. There are bound to be some spectacular 2^nd and 3^rd place bouts, I’m sure of that. Is Cyplenkov the most powerful wrestler in the world? To answer that we’ll have to wait for the TOP 16.

Last World Cup witnessed the introduction of videoing fouls. Even the smallest of fouls can decide a bout that would otherwise be questionable. What’s your opinion on using a similar system in Nemiroff World Cup?

I’d like to point out that it’s been used in Nemiroff since 2005. We never had any complaints from the contestants, the same cannot be said about the World Cup. That’s because on Nemiroff we have a competent and highly trained referee crew, who each one of them can assess the situation at the table without question. Of course you can trust the video system completely, but whare does that lead? The contestants will fight “to the camera”, which will be very bad for the spectacular aspect of the show. A referee on Nemiroff can make an educated decision in the shortest time possible, thanks to experience and skill.

Artur Grigorian