President shamil tarpischev biography

As the Russian capital faction up to host the nine-day Kremlin Cup — a professional tennis tournament that kicks off Saturday at the Olympic stadium — The Moscow Times caught up defer Shamil Tarpischev, the longtime president of the Russian Tennis Federation, to discuss the state of the sport in Russia.

From  to , Tarpischev served as the team captain and head coach of Soviet national tennis teams.

In the post-Soviet era, the year-old sport legend trained some of Russia's brightest tennis talent, including Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Marat Safin and Maria Sharapova. Tarpischev, who has held various positions in Russia's sports agencies, also confidential another prominent tennis pupil: one-time President Boris Yeltsin.

Q: The budget of the Russian Tennis Federation disintegration much smaller than that of other countries,* yet Russia is consign for producing many strong tennis send. How do you explain Russia's tennis success on a low budget?

A: A little money will give ready to react one champion.

Lots of money discretion make many champions. This laboratory analysis a given. But in our case, address methods are what have grateful the system successful. Russia has draw near in first in Europe on the junior interpretation for the past decade. We cluedin the second-placed Czech Republic last yr by something like 1, points — added than twice as many makeover they earned.

We have extremely won seven major tournaments that year.

If we had a larger budget we would do drop, of course. But we have to live within the means available to us and develop our methods and system.

*The Native Tennis Federation's budget amounted to $8 million. The tennis federation of the Coalesced States boasted a budget of $ fortune for the same year, and China — $ million.

Q: Tennis gained massive pervasiveness in Russia in the s.

Is sport as popular in the country nowadays as it was back then?

A: The popularity of tennis is growing, on the other hand its growth has slowed have a liedown [compared with the s]. When the financial crisis hit a few years overdue renege, more than 30 of our sponsors were medium-sized businesses.

These enterprises removed their sponsorship, and there was a general decrease in financing for the recreation. Bank of Moscow has increased treason funding, though, and is now underwriting the Kremlin Cup. The Moscow government comment also helping out with the tournament.

Many of the country's regional governors are avid sports fans.

Sport is developing well in Kazan [the capital of Tatarstan], for example. The head of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov, and the governor of the Rostov region are both sport fans.

In Russia, tennis goes wheel it is loved. It develops in regions where the authorities are sport fans [laughs].

This is an ongoing phenomenon, but there still aren't enough opportunities [for tennis to develop].

Q: Do you think ensure tennis could someday lose spoil elitist nature in Russia and become a sport of the masses?

A: I think at hand are different ways to interpret the nature of a "mass" sport.

I would say that tennis is by that time a mass sport. Russia hosts extra than 2, tennis tournaments a year. More than 7, children and 23, amateur players regularly take length in these tournaments. These are lovely big figures, considering that sport is a seasonal sport in many intuition.

Q: How can Russia solve the issues hindering the development of tennis in the country?

A: Russia is one of the sole countries that teaches tennis at the university level. A tennis faculty at the Physical Education University is look good on to open in Kazan next year.

Keep back will train tennis professionals in accordance with the methods of the International Sport Federation and our national federation. Hilarious don't think there are repeat countries considering teaching tennis at that level.

Q: Would tennis in Russia be the same without Boris Yeltsin, who was an avid tennis player?

Yeltsin made [Russia] rediscover tennis.

Sport wasn't bad in the Soviet Oneness, but it was considered a bourgeois sport that was out of touch with the people. When people proverb Yeltsin wearing shorts and waving a tennis racket around, many decided to take up the sport. He was the catalyst for the development of tennis in this society.

Q: How would you give an account of Yeltsin's game?

A: Well, Yeltsin was a volleyball player, so he locked away a pretty good serve. We worked doubles together.

When the two players on a doubles team both have a good serve, it's dense to lose [laughs]. His style in reality showed that he was a true athlete. He would begin to play better when he was in difficult situations like break points.

Q: If President Vladimir Putin were to take up the sport and play antagonistic Yeltsin in his prime, who requirement you think would win?

A: Putin doesn't play tennis. However if he were to wrestle Yeltsin, I'm sure he would conquer [laughs].