Iranian female athletes runner-up at Asian Kurash championship

The Iran women’s national kurash team claimed the second position, having won two gold medals, three silvers and three bronzes. Uzbekistan was named the top-ranked team with three gold medals, and four silvers.

Chinese Taipei finished in the third place with two gold medals and three bronzes.

Tahereh Azarpayvand and Fatemeh Barmaki won two gold medals for the Iranian delegation in the women’s minus 57-kilogram and over 87-kilogram weight categories at the end of their competitions at the Azadi Indoor Sports Complex in western Iran.

Additionally, Arezu Salimi, Rayhaneh Gilani and Haniyeh Vahdani clinched three silver medals in the minus 52-kilogram, minus 70-kilogram and minus 87-kilogram sections respectively.

Faezeh Ebrahimi, Pardis Eidivand and Saba Karamali pocketed three bronze medals for Iran in the women’s minus 48-kilogram, minus 63-kilogram and minus 78-kilogram weight classes.

The 13th edition of Asian Senior Kurash Championship in Iranian capital Tehran on June 6, and will finish on June 11, 2024.

The sports event has attracted tens of wrestlers from various Asian countries, including Chinese Taipei, India, Iran, South Korea, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

The Turkmen national wrestling competition, kurash (also written as goresh), is a kind of wrestling on belts that has ancient roots and dates back to as early as the third century BC. Wrestlers need to earn points by forcing the opponent to touch the mat with any part of the body except a foot.

Kurash competitions are staged in four formats, namely round, shootout, mixed, and team.

During the round format contests, athletes compete with all wrestlers in the same weight category. If there are many wrestlers in one weight division, the participants are divided into two groups. Wrestlers who earn the first and second places in each group will be in action for the final showdowns.

Wrestlers are eliminated from the rest of the competition once they lose in the shootout format.

In the mixed format, wrestlers start with the round format for the preliminary round and then shift to the shootout format.

In the team format, only one athlete from each weight category of a team is allowed to participate. Participating teams will fight one-on-one in the competitions.