Yesterday, August 30, the Spasskaya Tower International Military Music Festival for the first time in its twelve years history hosted the show performance of the riding archers. Debutants of the horse riding arena, the archers come from Russia and Mongolia.
“It is an honor for us to compete on Red Square”, said Ariunbold Dorj, prominent Mongolian sportsman. “After all we are the first Mongolians to be on Red Square on horses over the last 700 years”, joked the archer.
We all know that the descendants of Genghis Khan were brilliant riders and archers. These traditions are still alive in Mongolia. “Meanwhile in Russia this sport is pretty young”, told us Mr. Sergey Odinokov, President of the Riding Archers Federation of Russia, adding that the first Russian championship among riding archers was held in September 2017.
The show performance on Red Square featured three archers from each side. Their task was to run the distance as fast as possible hitting five targets placed around the arena. Each participant had three shots.
This day the luck was on the side of the Mongolian sportsmen with Erdenebat Batbaatar becoming the champion. For the first time he mounted a horse at the age of three, but only a year ago he got to doing riding archery. Sergey Ragozin and Sergey Odinokov from Russia came second and third, respectively. They both are members of the Russian national team and prize-winners of national and international competitions.
All the participant received valuable presents from the Kremlin Equestrian School presented by Mr. Boris Petrov, Director General of the school.
