ALEXANDRIA, Egypt – Sports and Youth Minister Ashraf Sobhy said that Egypt has a promising generation in the modern pentathlon who can snatch Olympic medals.
Sobhy, who attended the final competitions of the UIPM 2022 Modern Pentathlon World Cup, currently held in Alexandria, celebrated Egyptian athlete Mohamed el-Gendy’s winning of a silver medal at the championship.
Egyptian modern pentathlon athlete El-Gendy won a silver medal with 1,512 points at Modern Pentathlon World Cup, currently held in Alexandria.
Britain’s Joseph Chong won the gold with 1,514 points, while Hungary’s Blazes Zip won the bronze with 1,507 points.
The minister noted Egypt hosted 158 international championships in all games, lauding El-Gendy’s win as a source of pride and a good indicator for the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Egypt has managed win three medals in the tournament so far, the gold for the women’s relay and the silver for the men’s relay, in addition to the silver for the men’s singles for El-Gendy.
President of the International Modern Pentathlon Federation Klaus Schuermann, President of the Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport Ismail Abdel Ghaffar, and President of the Egyptian Modern Pentathlon Federation Sherif El Erian attended the closing ceremony of the championship.
As many as 43 countries took part in the tournament, taking place at the campus of the Arab Academy for Science, Technology, and Maritime Transport in Alexandria.
The participating countries are Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Canada, Chile, China, Taiwan, Colombia, Czech Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Britain, Guatemala, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Mali, Mexico, Moldova, Peru, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, the US, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Croatia, Denmark, Portugal, and Serbia, as well as Egypt..
Meanwhile, Haydy Morsy and Amira Kandil were the toast of Egypt after winning Women’s Relay gold on the second day of the World Championships.
“I’m super happy that we were leading since the Fencing – we finished 1st and in the Riding we made a clear round and won the Bonus Round,” gold medallist Haydy said.
“In our Swimming heat we finished 3rd, not so good, but then in the Laser Run we finished 1st. I’m super happy to be here in Egypt with the gold medal with my team-mate,” Haydy added.
Team-mate Amira said: “It was an amazing day with Haydy – the whole day was very good. To be No.1 all day, nobody in Egypt has done it like this.
“Yesterday we were taking pictures with the boys with their silver medals and we told them we would get the gold and they said ‘no way,” Amira added.
A day after the host nation claimed silver in the Men’s Relay thanks to Eslam Hamad and Ahmed Hamed, Tokyo 2020 Olympians Morsy and Kandil proved too hot to handle for the rest of the field.
A brave effort by Mariana Arceo and Mayan Oliver of Mexico almost ran them close, with only 7sec separating the top two teams at the end, while Korea added a bronze to their gold collected on day one, as Sehee Kim and Sunwoo Kim held off 4th-placed Wei Wang and Linzhi Xie of China.
UIPM President Dr Klaus Schormann said: “We often talk about the importance of athletes from all continents occupying the podium at UIPM major championships; we had three continents on the podium.
“My congratulations go to the athletes from Egypt, Mexico, Korea and China for their excellent performances. Following a successful first day at the UIPM 2022 Pentathlon World Championships we were treated to more excellent high performances.
“Once again my thanks go to the Egyptian Modern Pentathlon Federation for the excellent organisation of our flagship World Championships for women and men, which are organised every year.
Silver medallist Oliver (MEX) said: “We are very happy with this result. We were planning on giving our best for this relay and it ended up successful. I ran fine but I rushed my shooting.”
Team-mate Arceo (MEX) added: “We were Women’s Relay world champions in 2019 together and then the COVID-19 pandemic happened and it hit us hard, although in 2021 we still ended up in 4th place, very close from getting a medal. So yes, we’re very happy to get silver today and we’ll give our best next year to get gold!”
Bronze medallist Sehee Kim (KOR) said: “We were excited after the victory by our Men’s Relay team yesterday and we prepared well.
“Fencing was sometimes good and sometimes bad, Riding was good and Swimming was nice. In Laser Run we had some problems but we won the bronze medal and we are happy and excited.
“I thank my team-mate Sunwoo Kim so much. It’s midnight in Korea but we already received so many congratulations,” Sehee explained according to the UIPM official website.
