Belarus can win five medals at Olympic Games-2008

Belarusian athletes can win at least five medals at the forthcoming Olympic Games-2008 in Beijing, believes Anatoly Baduyev, the chief coach of the Belarusian national team.

At a working session in the Ministry of Sport and Tourism on February 26, Anatoly Baduyev informed that 69 Belarusian athletes have won Olympic licenses. However, the coaches believe that Belarus should send only those athletes who have real chances to advance to the finals in their disciplines. Therefore the coaches have chosen 38 athletes (24 women and 14 men) who can show high results in the Olympic Games. Ahead of the Games the Belarusians will compete in various events. The nearest of them is the world indoor championships on March 7-9 in Valencia, Spain.

The head coach of the Belarusian national weightlifting team, Alexander Goncharov, noted that ten weightlifters have earned Olympic berths. These are six men and four women. They are now training in accordance with the individual programmes. Alexander Goncharov believes that six Belarusian weightlifters have good medal chances.
Judo athletes will compete in the European championship in April while in Beijing they hope to win a least one medal.
The state coach in archery, Zhanna Popikova, and pentathlon team coach Valentin Rogov are sure that their athletes will pick up Olympic licenses and will get into best shape by the Olympic Games.

According to Alexander Kosinets, the chairman of the organizing committee handling the preparations for the Games-2008, sport has long become a political matter. When a state anthem is played at an international tournament especially Olympic Games and a flag is hoisted, the prestige of a country is enhanced many times. Therefore the leadership of the country helps their athletes in all areas and hopes that the expense will turn into Olympic medals. Our attitude should be to get to the top, however strong our competitors may be, then we will succeed, Alexander Kosinets said.