It was one of the toughest Worlds that i have ever seen. There happenned some suprises.
Sasho Andrei from Bulgaria won the left hand 75kg class as expected and Oleg Zhokh also did the same thing in 80kg left hand class. Zaza Tabagari returned to armwrestling after 2 years of absence and took 2. place to Oleg.
In 85kg left hand category Stefan Lengarov once again showed that he is the best. In the final he easily beat Vladimir Mnatsakanyan of Armenia.
In 90kg Artem Taynov who now represants Russia won the class as expected. In fact with left arm most of the favorites won their classes by ease such as Laletin of Russia 100kg, Matyushenko of Russia 110kg and Levan from Georgia won the +110 kg class as expected. With right arm there were more wars and surprises than the left hand categories.
In 55kg class there were many battles esspecially between the Kazakhs and the Georgians and the Kazakh athlete Aidarkhan ended up winning the class over the current WAF Champion Georgian Pretsuashvili. In 60kg class the finalists from the European Championships were the finalists of the WAF as well but this time the winner was Roman Tserekaev from Russia over the German puller Fabian Taeger who was the winner of the Europeans.
65kg class was full with the surprises. Last year's WAF champion Vali Farajov was toprolled by Oleg Cherkassov and sent to the B side and at the B side a very young Georgian athlete Irakli Zırakahsvili also toprolled and eliminated him. The biggest surprise of the class was Georgi Gaidardzhiev from Bulgaria. This guy had wars against Cherkassov and got tired before losing to Jambul Vibliani. But he still came back from the B side to beat Jambul in semi final and then beat Joseph Andria of Egypt in the final to take the gold.
70kg class was expected to have a final between last year's finalists Zair Akhmedov and Khetag Dzitiev. This happenned but Zair had easier time this year compared to the last year. IMO in their final match the slip was not a win but either a foul or strap but judging from their early match it is not hard to say that Zair was better. IMO in this class Matthiass from Germany deserved the 3. place but even though he won 4 times against (in A and B side) Hristo he was fouled out somehow. He was also made to beat Vephkia 4 times before he had to pull Hristo for bronze medal match. These things dont look good from outside and i really hope that these things will not happen again.
75kg right hand category was awesome and esspecially Gashevski showed that why he is a Legend. Gashevski had many wars with minutes long wars against many of the top pullers such as Sedrekyan, Akperov and some others but he still managed to reach to the final against the Kazakh puller and still troubled him some even though his opponent was much fresher than himself. At the age of 45 Gashevski seemed to be the real winner of the class in the hearts of the spectators.
In 80kg Zoloev was above the other competetitors even though 19 years old Turkish puller Oguzhan Kocak gave him 6-7 seconds of trouble in the qualification rounds. Oguzhan was able to send the silver medalist Georgian puller Zurab to the B side but in the semi final he lost against him after a tough match and took 3. place. In the final Zoloev beat Zurab easily to take the gold medal once again.These 3 mentioned athletes were much above the rest of the pullers in this category.
85kg class was also a suprising class. This class could have won by Plamen Dmitrov who actually toprolled and was about to beat Spartak Zoloev but lost on foul in the last match of the A side. Plamen then had a very long match against Ongarbayev from Kazakstan and both athletes were done. Ongarbayev won the match but lost against Spartak easily in the final match.
90kg class was with the absence of Prudnyk who was injured. People thought this class' favorite was Gasparini who is the rising star of our sport. Gasparini had some wars but still reached to the final but Dieter Spannagel from Germany seemed to be too strong for anyone on that day. I have never seen him that strong and muscular before. He did a quick job against everyone that he faced on that day. Stojan Golemanov took 3. place in this class.
100kg class final was one of the most unforgetable match between the multiple time 90kg WAF champion Kazakh Alexander Getalo and the Russian Vitaly Laletin. Their match took probably longer than 10 minutes and it was like a chess game. Laletin came from B side and beat Getalo twice in the final. Laletin toprolled Getalo but couldnt finish, so he decided to wait there till Getalo gave up. We expected Krasimir to win the 110kg class easily but the final match against the Krygiz puller became a night mare for Krasimir. I the first start Krygiz puller actually pinned Krasimir after a tough match but Krasimir got a foul. In the re-start Krygiz puller still looked like the one who was closer to win but he kind of hurried too much and Krasimir just used his experienced to catch a serious mistake to use in his advantage and won another WAF title.
In +110kg class everyone expected Levani to win the class esspecially his 2 tough opponents from the Europeans Cvetkov and Ertem were eliminated but Genady Kvikvinia from Georgia who had been away from armwrestling for 2 years beat Levani in the final twice to take the gold.
Engin Terzi