If athletes, who quitted armwrestling long time ago, have the motivation and health, then of course they should come back. If they quitted armwrestling then there had to be a reason and as long as that reason or any other reason do not exist anymore then I see no problem about them to return to our sport.

We can not always say that the come backs aren’t so effective. Rustam just beat current 90kg WAF Champion Ermes Gasparini at Senec Hand event. So he looked good enough. Voevoda did not look as good as he was in his 20s, but remember, that this was his second come back. His first come back looked very good against Michael Todd and Voevoda won that Armfight 6-0 against Michael. His second come back was against Tim Bresnan and yes, Alexey did not look as good as how he was in mid 2000s. But remember that this was his first competetion and I have no doubt that he would continue trying then he would become better & better.

Richard Lupkes made a come back in mid 2000s after more than 15 years of break and he was succesful esspecially for someone who was at 50s.

As an example of unsuccesful come back we can show Gary Goodridge but we must realise that he had a very tough career in fighting sports and I can imagine that all those fights took a lot from him.

Craig Tullier is a good example for a succesful come back. He had been WAF finalist twice (2000-2001). Then he did not pull for more than 10 years and right now he is succesfuly pulling even though he is a middle weight class puller now.

I believe that it is possible to make a good come back but it takes some time both for physical and mental preparation. There are two things that are very important to be a succesful armwrestling. First one is motivation, more you want more you reach your potential limits. Second one is physical shape, if you have injuries and if they are cronic then it is not possible for you to reach your limits. So if you quitted armwrestling because you lost your motivation or because you have cronic injuries then your come back will not be succesful as long as your problems are not solved.

After 25 years I finally decided to quit armwrestling because of the two reasons that I just mentioned above. I don’t believe that I will be back but even if I come back I dont think that I will be succesful esspecially if we consider that I am 42 years old and for me it is time to become weaker from now on. So I don’t expect my motivation to come back neither my injuries to be healed from now on. I plan to lift for keeping myself in shape and I may help others as a training partner but I don’t want to compete anymore. Anyone who has motivation to pull and is injury free, should expect to be succesful even after a long break. But it may take some time to reach to the top.

Engin Terzi