I tried to watch the live broadcasting but was not able to watch everything, because most of the times there was a close filming to one table, while there were 5 or 6 tables in the competetion. And even though sometimes they showed all the tables at once, it was not possible to see everything clearly, because of the camera being far and refs were blocking the view. I also missed the right hand finals. I would like to share my impressions from the things that i was able to watch.

In 75kg left hand category Zaur Saidov looked very impressive with his incredibly fast forward hook style. I thought he would win the category but Alexander Bulenkov was in a great shape and stopped Saidov's first attack and then balanced the match to force Saidov to battle in an endurance game. Bulenkov had a tough match with Kalymikov before he met Saidov but he ended up winning against Saidov as well. I was impressed by Bulenkov's form.

70kg left hand category was very interesting as well. Last EAC champion Georgi Khubaev and A1 champion Khetag Dzitiev placed out of top 5. The guys who defeated them are unknown to me. It just shows the level of the Russian national championships.

In 90kg left hand category it was suprising to see Artem Taynov competing the Russian nationals to represant team Russia. He and Spartak Zoloev had a very tough match on qualification round and Taynov ended up being the winner.

In 80kg the biggest surprise in left hand class was Urtaev Atsamaz to place 18., i say it was the biggest suprise because Atsamaz has been the finalist with Oleg Zhokh in 2013 & 2014 events such as WAF ,EAC and A1 events. I do not think that i have seen the winner of this class before but the second place Ruslan Nabiev has been part of team Russia many times before.

In 65kg left hand last year's World and European Champion Oleg Cherkasov once again showed his dominance in his category. He is an powerful puller who also beat Khetag Dzitiev in a pro event with right & left only a few months ago.

In women's 55kg left hand category Tatiana Istomina looked dominant against her opponents, while in 65kg category Ekatarina Nikisheva came back from the B side to beat Irina Gladkaya after 2 strap matches. Ekatarina took Irina's wrist by a dropped front wrist pulling style and beat her twice. First match of the final was not easy but the second match it seemed like Gladkaya was already too tired to fight back. These are my left hand impressions of the Russian Nationals.

Engin Terzi