Iran shines in 14th World Wushu championships 2017

[_Navid_]

Surprising we don't have a thread on this!

The games have been going on in the past 5 days in Kazan Russia. For those who don't know it is a combination of wrestling, Taekwondo and Karate and I personally find it more entertaining than Taekwondo, Karate and Judo!

Iran won a stunning 8 gold medals today, not only making it their best ever performance but winning the combined men and women's Sanda Wushu for the first time ever with 7 golds and 1 silver.

Our women won 3 out of 3 finals (2 of them were Mansourian sisters) and our men won 4 out of 5.
We also won 1 gold and 2 Bronze in non-combat Wushu.

This is arguably Iran's best sport and had it been in the Olympics our total gold medals would have been double digit. Too bad world powers aren't good at it to include it in the games. It was included as experimental sport in 2008 Olympics and we won 6 gold medals.

You can see all the finals here:

[Ab-Gosht]

yes we are unreal at wushu, asian games does have it thats the fun we can have!

[Persian-Pride87]

It's a shame Wushu is not in the Olympics. We would haul in so many medals.

[Irannn]

Let me explain something, in Wushu they have limitations about the number of athletes per country, countries can enter max 5 men and 3 women in Sanda, while we have 11 weight classes for men and 7 for women.

NONE of our gold medals beat China, NONE of them, there were only one Iran-China match here, the last match of the competition when the Chinese guy manhandled and totally dominated our multiple world champion Gholipour. our other 7 Sanda athletes won the gold medal without losing a single round. we rarely lose to non-Chinese athletes here in this sport.

in women's classes, China won 3 gold medals, Iran won 3 as well and the last gold went to India.
in men's classes ,for whatever reason China entered only 4 athletes and not 5 ! that's why Iran topped the medal table in Sanda and not China, even though China completely dominated the competition in the general medal table (Sanda and Taolu) , they had 15 athletes and they all won the gold medal. personally I would prefer having China-Iran duals in all 11 weight classes, that way we could find out how good we really are in this sport.

Our Wushu federatoin is doing a great job developing the sport inside the country, no surprise we are becoming better and better in this sport, we are clearly #2 in the world in Sanda but we are still far behind China. even though our male athletes sometimes beat China here and there but they are still better in general, in women's classes they are still unbeatable for everybody including us.
Just for info, couple months ago at the Universiade two of our athletes beat China to win the gold medal.

when it comes to the Asian Games (which has the higher importance than the World Championships), they exclude all these heavier classes , we will have only lower weight classes where we are not dominating. last time in Incheon we won only 1 gold medal and that was the phenomenal MohammadSeifi who even dominated his Chinese opponent. but we lost twice to South Korea.

if I'm not wrong China lost only and only 4 matches in the whole history of the Asian Games, all of them to the Iranians ! Ojaghi and Aghaei 2002, Gholipour 2010 and Mohammadseifi 2014.

[_Navid_]

^ Thank you for the great analysis.

Mohammadseifi is truly a legend. The guy hasn't lost a single fight as far as I know since 2010.
Since a few years ago I always thought he is the number 1 Iranian athlete you have least stress about and can bet on winning a gold medal in a world tournament. Followed by Gholipour and Hasan Yazdani.

Gholipour's gold medal match was not really a fair one to comment on. The Chinese looked at least 20kg heavier and so he was able to push him easily out of the mat. It was Gholipour's first tournament in 90+ and had they been the same weight he would have beaten the Chinese.

I think in the next Asian games we can expect 3 or 4 gold medals. Too bad Hashemi and possibly Gholipour may retire.

[Irannn]

^ Thank you for the great analysis.

Mohammadseifi is truly a legend. The guy hasn't lost a single fight as far as I know since 2010.
Since a few years ago I always thought he is the number 1 Iranian athlete you have least stress about and can bet on winning a gold medal in a world tournament. Followed by Gholipour and Hasan Yazdani.

Gholipour's gold medal match was not really a fair one to comment on. The Chinese looked at least 20kg heavier and so he was able to push him easily out of the mat. It was Gholipour's first tournament in 90+ and had they been the same weight he would have beaten the Chinese.

I think in the next Asian games we can expect 3 or 4 gold medals. Too bad Hashemi and possibly Gholipour may retire.

Actually I remember he lost a match back in 2015 in Iranian league, he was competing one weight up against another Iranian World national team member Sajjad Abbasi. while Seifi was leading on points by a big gap, in an action Abbasi kicked him to the head and knocked him out. that was his only defeat since 2009. even though that was probably just an accident but still ...

3 or 4 gold medals is very optimistic IMO. We will have so many changes in the sports program thanks to the Indonesian organizers ! still waiting for the official confirmation but based on the proposal they cut the number of events in Wushu from 15 to 12. and remember Indonesia is very good in Taolu, which means we will probably lose 3 Sanda weight classes. means less gold medal chance for Iran.

even if they keep the current (2010/2014) program, it will be really hard to win more than 1-2 gold medals, women's gold medals are completely out of reach because of China. unless they want to "let" others to win something, back in 2010, China didn't enter in one of the women's weights and Khadijeh Azadpour won that gold medal for Iran. but in 2014 China entered athletes in both weights and won two gold medals easily, beating both Mansourian sisters.
even in men's classes we only have lower weight classes in the AG ! in past we had 56, 60, 65, 70 and 75. we are not that dominating in lower weights. Gholipour had to cut something like 10-15 kgs to compete at the 2010 event in 75kg.

but the funny thing is, less than a year before the Asian Games, we still don't know the exact number of sports/events ! but there will be some revolutionary changes.

[Persian-Pride87]

Your level of knowledge on everything relating to Iranian sports is astounding. Thank you so much for always taking the time and posting and educating us here on PFDC. I both appreciate and love reading your posts.

Actually I remember he lost a match back in 2015 in Iranian league, he was competing one weight up against another Iranian World national team member Sajjad Abbasi. while Seifi was leading on points by a big gap, in an action Abbasi kicked him to the head and knocked him out. that was his only defeat since 2009. even though that was probably just an accident but still ...

3 or 4 gold medals is very optimistic IMO. We will have so many changes in the sports program thanks to the Indonesian organizers ! still waiting for the official confirmation but based on the proposal they cut the number of events in Wushu from 15 to 12. and remember Indonesia is very good in Taolu, which means we will probably lose 3 Sanda weight classes. means less gold medal chance for Iran.

even if they keep the current (2010/2014) program, it will be really hard to win more than 1-2 gold medals, women's gold medals are completely out of reach because of China. unless they want to "let" others to win something, back in 2010, China didn't enter in one of the women's weights and Khadijeh Azadpour won that gold medal for Iran. but in 2014 China entered athletes in both weights and won two gold medals easily, beating both Mansourian sisters.
even in men's classes we only have lower weight classes in the AG ! in past we had 56, 60, 65, 70 and 75. we are not that dominating in lower weights. Gholipour had to cut something like 10-15 kgs to compete at the 2010 event in 75kg.

but the funny thing is, less than a year before the Asian Games, we still don't know the exact number of sports/events ! but there will be some revolutionary changes.

[Rooyintan]

I hope in future olympics Wushu and Karate will be there, Iran will get many medals if there are no corrupt refs in events.

It is a shame that Iran is hopeless in Polo (a sport originated in Iran)!
Iran needs to aim for Judo, Boxing and Volleyball medals in the future olympics.

[Irannn]

I hope in future olympics Wushu and Karate will be there, Iran will get many medals if there are no corrupt refs in events.

It is a shame that Iran is hopeless in Polo (a sport originated in Iran)!
Iran needs to aim for Judo, Boxing and Volleyball medals in the future olympics.

Karate will be at the next Olympic in 2020 but as you probably know, only for this one ! even though I expect France to add Karate for 2024 Olympics as well. USA won't add it for 2028 for sure unless Karate becomes a full Olympic sport before then.

for Wushu it's still a VERY long shot. first because the sport is dominated by few countries and second because IOC considers Sanda as something "dangerous". you might say in this case Boxing is also dangerous but remember Boxing is Boxing, a very popular sport around the world. according to Iran Wushu federation president (who is a member of international federation) even if Wushu makes it to the Olympic, their primary target is for Taolu events and not Sanda. personally I don't count on this.

PS: because of IOC new rules, the host nation can nominate some new sports for the program , if we had this for 2008 China would add Wushu for sure but this is from 2020 and Japan added 5 sports to the program. Karate is popular in France and they are good in this sport so we will probably have karate again in 2024.