Petro Pakhniuk ended up as the leading Ukrainian all-arounder at the beginning of this year, after Oleg Verniaiev temporarily stopped competing in order to recover from injuries. He won a bronze at the American Cup but then got injured in Stuttgart. Gennady Sartynsky, the Ukrainian’s team coach, said in April that Pakhniuk doesn’t currently need a surgery but the recovery is still ongoing. Pakhniuk talked to iSport.ua about his plans for the season and how he would like to stop doing AA and become an event specialist but isn’t allowed to do so:
“I’m preparing for the European Championships but it all depends on the [head] coach. I’m still not doing dismounts, I’m walking carefully but I’m preparing. It’s my goal. I have a desire to go. It’s more than a desire, it’s a dream”.
“On average, I have one or two injuries a year. It could be at the beginning of the year or at the end. Gymnastics is an injury-prone sport and you never know when an injury is going to happen. You’re setting the expectations for the injuries not to happen, you’re preparing for months, for years, and then in one second you lose everything you’ve been working for and the recovery and getting back in shape is starting again. This year, the injury happened at the beginning of the year, that’s very upsetting, but I want to recover by the European Championships, World Championships. That’s my main goal”.
“I can compete in the all-around, I can do it quite well for the team, but I’m not allowed [to focus] on just specific events. Perhaps I’d like to be an event specialist but the head coach isn’t letting me. I have to work in the all-around for the team. These Worlds are part of the Olympic qualification, we have to qualify to the Olympics and already at these Worlds, we have to make top-24 teams. The European Championships will be more for me, but at Worlds I’ll have to work for the team”.
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