Romanian National's - by David Shead

 

Romanian Nationals 2013

 

The Romanian Nationals once again were a well organised and very large event with 372 competitors and 703 entries making it one of the largest Nationals in the world!

 

Held over 2 days at the lovely National palace of children venue and led by their president Cristian Dulgheru and their manager Mircea Simionescu-Simicel, it was run on just 3 tables (because that’s what the TV Company requested) the whole competition was shown live on the Voyo.ro web site and the finals go out live on Romanian TV Sport.ro, and for those of you who missed it some of it will be on www.bratdefier.ro .

 

They use a similar scoring program to the EAF as at the EAF Championships, so it is very fast and backed up with officials making sure the competitors are ready then sending them to the tables as soon as the tables are free, so the referees are working non stop.

 

Even working at this pace it still takes about 5 hours to get through so many competitors. However they have built a good team of Referees who come back each year, and it is always nice to see them grow in stature as well as in numbers. They had 8 already qualified and 11 training Referees working at these championships, all under the guidance of Victor Barbu who is strict with both the competitors and the Referees, just what you need at a competition of this size.

 

There was a marked increase in the technical level of the wrestlers, however the only downside is that they need more woman armwrestlers.

 

David Shead

EAF Assistant Director of Referees