UNN international students win prizes at the 5th World Nomad Games
From September 8 to 13, the 5th World Nomad Games took place in the capital of Kazakhstan, Astana. Over the course of a week, competitions were held across 21 sports, with approximately 2,500 participants from 89 countries. The programme included national wrestling, martial arts competitions, archery, horse racing, falconry, demonstration performances in ethnic sports, traditional intellectual as well as folk games, and much more. Russia was represented by 300 athletes.
Competitions were also held in the ancient intellectual game of nomadic peoples ’’Togyzqumalaq (toguz korgool)’’, which is on the UNESCO list of intangible cultural heritage. The game is also known as ’’the chess of the steppes’’. It develops strategic and mathematical thinking.
In this discipline, Altynai Shambetova from the Kyrgyz Republic, a 2nd year Master's student at the UNN Faculty of Physical Education and Sports, won bronze in the individual classification and silver in the team classification. 1st year student of Lobachevsky University Ayzada Baktybekova won gold in the team competition and bronze in the individual competition in the discipline ’’Oware’’.
The Russian national team took third place in the team standings.
Over the past year, coaches, organisers and athletes of the World Nomad Games project have been studying at UNN on the Master's programme ’’Psychology of Sport, Physical Education and Healthy Lifestyle’’. As part of the training, substantial work is being done to build a scientifically sound system of psychological support for athletes of national sports in Kyrgyzstan.
The programme of the 5th World Nomad Games included an international scientific and practical conference "Nomads: History, Knowledge, Lessons". Svetlana Sokolovskaya, Head of the Master's Programme, Head of the Department of Sports Medicine and Psychology at Lobachevsky University, made a report on "Psychological support of athletes of the Kyrgyz Republic national team in toguz korgool". The project was conducted jointly with the head coach of the Kyrgyz national team Nuriya Sultanmuratova and sports psychologist Nuraiym Dulatova (both are master's students at Lobachevsky University).
The rich diversity of nomadic culture was presented by the organisers of the Games by setting up an ethnic aul, which was called "Nomadic Universe". Here one could see yurts (nomadic houses) of different ethnic groups of Kazakhstan and get acquainted with cultural and tourist peculiarities of its regions. The Museum of Nomadic Civilisation and the City of Craftsmen also had expositions in the Ethno Village.
About 100 thousand guests visited Kazakhstan during the event.
