As the Olympic Games draw to a close in Beijing, the Cyprus team will look back on the experience with mixed emotions
CYPRUS ended its participation at the Beijing Olympics with mixed emotions. Without doubt, this was the best ever performance by the island at the Games, since it started competing independently at the Moscow games in 1980, but that all-elusive first medal still remains beyond reach.
Cyprus’ love affair with shooting goes back to the inaugural Olympic Games of the modern era. It was in 1896 in Athens that Ioannis Phrangoudes, the only Cypriot to ever to win a medal, clinched a gold, a silver and a bronze – although these have been credited to Greece, under whose flag Cypriots participated.
One hundred and twelve years later, Cyprus came as close as possible to bringing home its first medal since Athens 1896. Antonis Nikolaides lost a shoot-off to Anthony Terras of France for the bronze medal of the men’s Skeet competition, while the reigning world champion, George Achilleos, finished just behind, in 5th.
A day earlier, Andri Eleftheriou had become the best-ranked Cypriot since 1980 at any Olympic competition, finishing 7th in the women’s Skeet and narrowly missing a berth in the finals – only to see her achievement bettered by Nikolaides and Achilleos the next day.
In sailing, Cyprus narrowly missed entering the top ten, with Andreas Cariolou in the men’s RS:X class and Pavlos Kontides in the Laser class both finishing 13th overall. Gavriella Hadjidamianou was 21st in the women’s RS:X class and Charis Papadopoulos was 22nd in the Finn class.
In athletics, Kyriacos Ioannou cleared 2.25m in the men’s High Jump – 10cm below his own national record for seventh place in his qualification group and 18th place overall. He was aiming to become the first Cypriot to qualify for a Track and Field final.
Anna Foitidou in the women’s Pole Vault, Skevi Theodorou in the women’s Hammer and Alexandra Tsisiou in the women’s Javelin also failed to better their personal bests and did not make the finals of their events.
Both of Cyprus’ swimmers failed to qualify past the first round in three events. Anna Stylianou however smashed two national records in her first Olympic appearance. The 22-year-old shattered her own national record of 2:01.60 in the 200m Freestyle, finishing third in her heat in 2:00:55. A day later she swam the 100m Freestyle in 56.38 to break her own record of 56.77.
Competing in the 69kg category of the Weightlifting competition in Beijing, Demetris Minasides finished 20th overall, but left with high hopes for the future. The 19-year-old was the second youngest athlete in his category and was the first weightlifter to represent Cyprus at the Olympic Games.
