Gold medallist Yevgeniy Lukyanenko in action in the men's pole vault (© Getty Images)
For four days the Central Stadium of Kazan will turn into the capital of Russian Athletics. The Russian National Championships will be held here from the 17 to the 20 July, and according to the results the Olympic team will be finalised.
In some events the Olympians have been already announced:
Marathon
Men: Alekesei Sokolov, Grigoriy Andreev, Oleg Kulkov
Women: Galina Bogomolova, Svetlana Zakharova, Irina Timofeeva
Race Walking
Men: (20km) Valeriy Borchin, Serhei Morozov, Ilya Markov; (50km) Denis Nizhegorodov, Vkadimir Kanaikin, Igor Erikhin.
Women: Olga Kaniskina, Tatyana Sibeleva, Tatyana Kalmykova.
Combined Events
Decathlon (men): Aleksei Sysoev, Aleksandr Pogorelov, Alekesei Drozdov.
Heptathlon (women): Tatyana Chernova, Anna Bogdanova, Olga Kurban.
Other members of the Olympic team will be determined in Kazan
One may divide the whole programme of the Russian Nationals into three parts. The first one is happily tiny, these are the events where Russian athletes do not have chances of winning:
To these one may attribute the men's 100m, 1500m, 5000m and 10,000m, Steeplechase, Long Jump, and some throwing events. Hopefully the winners of these disciplines will receive tickets to the Games but frankly speaking at present their chances of Olympic greatness look rather limited.
The second group consists of the events where Russian athletics has evident leaders whose chances of winning are rather high:
In the men's events these are the Olympic champion Yuriy Borzakovskiy (2004, 800m), World Indoor champion Yevgeniy Lukyanenko (2008, Pole Vault), World outdoor champion Sergey Makarov (2003, Javelin Throw). In women's events these include the reigning World Indoor champion and World record holder Yelena Soboleva who seems likely to try her luck in both 800 and 1500m, and Olympic Long Jump champion Tatyana Lebedeva who'll attempt to double in the horizontal jumps.
And finally the most solid group is the one where the number of contenders is twice or even thrice as big as the limited number of places in the national team:
In the women's Pole Vault the leader is absolutely evident and that is Yelena Isinbayeva. But her opponents are so numerous - Svetlana Feofanova, Yulia Golubchikova, Tatyana Polnova are the main ones. But please do not cross out Anastasiya Shvedova and Aleksandra Kiriashova. In the women's Long Jump the contenders (naturally besides Lebedeva) are European champion Lyudmila Kolchanova, Olympic silver and bronze medallists Irina Simagina and Tatyana Kotova, Anna Nazarova and Yelena Sokolova.
Yaroslav Rybakov is one of the most stable and consistent high jumpers of recent years. His main opponents on the Russian soil are the champion of Europe Andrei Silnov, Andrei Tereshin, Andrei Dmitrik, Ivan Ukhov, Aleksandr Shustov.
There are six places in the men's 4x400m relay but 10 runners are eager to get the berths. There are even more contenders as eager to gain a place in the women's 4x400m event.
It looks like that the period of numerous injuries is over for the World record holder in the 3000m Steeplechase Gulnara Galkina-Samitova and she'll try to prove it again racing with the World champion Yekaterina Volkova, and the World silver medallist Tatyana Petrova.
The women's Discus Throw will also be a focus of attention, the world season leader Darya Pishchalnikova, the European champion and last year’s World silver medallist, will met the Olympic champion Natalya Sadova.
This year Russian athletics celebrates its 120 anniversary and it seems to be about to select a very strong Olympic team.
Nickolai Dolgopolov and Rostislav Orlov for the IAAF
