Ukrainian girl wins at world arm wrestling championship

The second Ruslana Kulyk gripped her opponent’s hand, she knew she was stronger.

The 16-year-old Kulyk, from Poltava Oblast, had reached the final on Sept. 5 of the World Armwrestling Championship in Budapest, Hungary, in the 70-kilogram weight category. She was up against Zalina Khosroeva from Russia.

“I had the feeling she was much weaker than I was,” says Kulyk.

And the Russian was.

“Believe it or not, I knew I was going to win,” says Kulyk. “I had this weird feeling, which I cannot explain, that everything was going to work out just fine.”

This was not the first competition Kulyk has won, but this year’s championship in Hungary was especially important. The victory has opened many new doors for her, including an invitation to study in Slovenia, which she has accepted.

No high hopes

Kulyk’s sports career started in the small city of Kobelyaky in Poltava Oblast, when she was only 12. Her introduction to the sport came by chance — she had gone to Kobelyaky’s arm wrestling club in September 2013 to kill some time between school and her dancing lessons.

“I didn’t choose arm wrestling because I was really in love with this sport,” says Kulyk. “It’s a lot simpler than that — lots of people around me were into arm wrestling, and I just decided to give it a shot too.”

She met her first coach, Artem Pysmak, at the club. At first, he had no high hopes for the girl. Many new faces would join the club at the beginning of the school year and, as a rule, they would drop out in a month or two.

But Kulyk soon proved to be an exception.

Within a year of intense training, she had started to win her first contests. Both student and coach then realized that Kulyk had a talent for the sport that could take her far beyond killing time in a sports club after school.

“The coach was so shocked when I started winning my first contests,” laughs Kulyk. “But when I let him know I was pretty serious about my decision to become professional arm wrestler, he set the goal of making me a champion.”

When her coach asked her: “Do you want to be a winner?” she hesitated for a second. Saying “yes” would mean she had to devote all her time and energy to the sport, work twice as hard at it, and have half as much free time. Saying “no” was the more tempting and easier option for a 13-year-old girl who had previously just wanted to learn dancing.

But when she did answer, there was no trace of doubt.

“Yes, I want to be a winner,” Kulyk said confidently. And that was the beginning of her path to success.

The price of that success is that Kulyk has had virtually no free time since then. She juggles training, endless competitions, and school. Taking part in competitions results in pain in the joints and tendons, as well as overall exhaustion, not to mention the stress beforehand.

“Competitions are very stressful and I had to learn to cope with the pressure on my own,” says Kulyk.

Anger helps

Every athlete eventually comes up with their own way of coping with pressure. Kulyk says a little bit of aggression helps her performance.

“I often see people listening to music before going on a stage,” Kulyk says. “But for me, anger is what helps me to get the best results possible: If I’m not angry — I’m not that good.”
Another tip is to keep calm.

“It sounds very easy, but only professionals are able not to freak out before going on stage, with thousands of people watching your every move,” she says.

As a result of her win in Budapest, Kulyk was invited to study to be a sports coach by a sports school in Slovenia. Now she says she doesn’t know whether she will compete for Slovenia or Ukraine in the future.

“I like Ukraine very much, it is my home, but here I spend more on medical treatment than I earn,” she says.

Already the world champion arm-wrestler among female juniors at the age of just 16, Kulyk hopes to have a long professional career ahead of her, no matter which country she chooses to represent.

“Now I can’t imagine my life without arm wrestling. I’m extremely glad to have my dream career at such a young age. This is only the beginning.” n