Bulgaria's Olympic prospects

28/07/2008

Bulgaria has won a total of 213 Olympic medals, almost all of them in the summer games held since the end of World War II.

(Sofia Echo, Dnevnik, Standart, SNA, Bulgarian Government - 20/07/08; Bulgarian Olympic Committee; Official Website of the Beijing 2008 Olympics)

Bulgarian Olympics Committee Chairwoman Stefka Kostadinova (left) addresses journalists in Sofia after the men's and women's weightlifting teams tested positive for an anabolic steroid. [Getty Images]

Scores of Bulgarians joined officials at a July 20th ceremony in downtown Sofia to wish their Olympic team good luck. "We hope to hear Bulgaria's national anthem all over the world," Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev said.

Among the officials attending the ceremony was Bulgarian Olympics Committee (BOC) Chairwoman Stefka Kostadinova, whose 2.09m world record in the women's high jump has remained unbroken since 1987.

She said self-confidence and a strong will to fight to the end are the keys to winning the title in a sport.

Bulgaria was among the 14 countries participating in the first modern Olympiad in Athens in 1896 and has won a total of 207 medals in summer games. Its biggest success was in the Moscow 1980 Olympics, when it finished third with a total of 41 medals, including eight gold. Bulgaria, however, took away only 12 medals from the Athens Olympics in 2004.

Maria Grozdeva is among the 73 Bulgarian athletes who will participate in 15 different events at the Beijing Games and is widely viewed as one of the possible medalists. She competes in the 25m pistol and the 10m air pistol events and is the only Bulgarian contestant with five medals from four Olympiads. Another Bulgarian shooter, Tanyu Kiryakov, won gold in the 10m air pistol men's event in Seoul and Sydney.

Bulgaria's Olympic team includes 20 track-and-field athletes, among them Ivet Lalova and Tezdjan Naimova, both competing in the 100m and 200m dashes. Lalova, whose personal best in the 100m sprint is 10.77 seconds, finished fourth in Athens. Naimova will make her Olympics debut this year.

Bulgaria is pinning medal hopes on its 13 wrestlers, including Stanka Zlateva and Yavor Yanakiev, respective female and male titlists at the 2007 World Championship in Baku.

Bulgarians also have high hopes that their men's volleyball team will be able to win a medal in Beijing.

Matei Kaziiski of the volleyball team, which returns to the Olympics after a 12-year break, believes he and his colleagues have "the strength to become champions".

Rhythmic gymnastics is another sport that could bring medals to Bulgaria, particularly in the team event. The country's ensemble won the silver in Atlanta in 1996 and the bronze in Athens in 2004.

Other Olympic medalists on the team include Yordan Yovchev, competing in artistic gymnastics, and rower Rumiana Neikova, who won the silver in skiff at Sydney in 2000.

Bulgaria was supposed to participate in 16 sports in Beijing, but 11 weightlifters tested positive for steroids in June, forcing the country to withdraw its male and female lifters.