RUSSIAN AMAZONS

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 December 1934, Page 12

RUSSIAN AMAZONS

“FOR WORK AND WAR.” Gas mask drill, rope climbing, bicycle racing, would seem odd sports for American women. Even the versatility of the omnipotent Babe Didrickson has not yet extended to. such things. Yet they are the activities ot a whole nation of women on the other side of the Atlantic to-day, says an American writer. Russian women, by the hundreds ot thousands, are practising the use ot gas masks, learning to sprint up rope and pole at a sailor’s speed, and cutting hot tracks in cinder paths in a milling medley of sports which has suddenly broken out in the Soviet Union. x The Soviet Government wants Russian women to be prepared for war and fitted for work. They are encouraged to compete with men on equal terms in all sports. A mammoth sports programme is being conducted as the means to this dual training. The women have responded eagerly to the Government’s sponsoring of sport. They like both the sport and the resultant fitness. They areas interested in training their bodies as they were in leaving their domestic routine for the factory.

Russia is bringing up the present generation of girl athletes with an eye to amazons of the future. Women are admitted into the army, in many branches of the service, with no restrictions. They are especially welcome in the aviation corps. Many women have risen to the rank of officer, one even to that of major, in aviation. “Ready for Work and Defence” is the title of the highest sports medal, awarded by the Association for Labour and Defence, and recently won by Miss Nina Karharkine. To gain it, skill must be proven in a wide variety of fields. It stands for genuine all-round ability, of a completeness found onlyin a country’s few exceptional athletes elsewhere. Yet several Russian women have already attained it, and all look upon it as their goal. Qualification for its demands the passing of innumerable athletic tests. The 500 metres on the track must be covered in 2.10. Ropes must be climbed to a height of three metres. Rowing standards are set rigidly for different types of boats and the strength of the current rowed against.

The gas mask drill, like other army type activities, meets with international army requirements. Swimming and life-saving, tennis, gymnastics, skating, skiing, and other familiar sports are included in the round of required abilities for the Ready for Work and Defence medal.

PROUD RUSSIAN RECORDS. The U.S.S.R. champion women’s ski team, noted for its success in international competition with the Scandinavian countries, is regarded as an example for the future. But the girls are less interested in international competition than in pulling up their own records and setting up Russian records of which they may be proud. The huge sports stadia, to which the workers go in leisure hours, are filled with men and women playing side by side. Handball is played by mixed teams, and crew races contested by men and women crews together. There is a sports fraternity between the sexes. Hordes of men and women are turning out over the snow in all directions for winter sports. Toboghnning, skiing, ski-jumping, figure skating, speed skating, are all drawing new enthusiasts. More than 380 ski-ing clubs attest to the rapid growth of that sport. In .one sports event 100,000 men and women competed. To go with statistics, which may be dry, but are enlightening, Russia’s sports promotion policy has resulted in 28.500 sports organisations among factory workers. There are 4000 stadia and sports fields and 2000 gymnasiums. And, finally, since the first Five-year Plan, the number of sportswomen and men in the Soviet Union has increased four times.

Field hockey, tennis, and ice hockey are among the favourite sports. Swimming, boating and diving are popular in season. Motor boats are owned by trade unions situated near water, and members race against members of other unions.

Sports equipment is being placed within reach of everyone. Boys and girls, men and women, are’ doing athr letics together, teaching each other, using the same apparatus, playing with each other for a common end. As one item of sports expansion, no less than 900,000 tennis balls have been ordered for Moscow trade unions, for one season. The old folk dances are being preserved, while modern athletics are being cultivated. The new policy of physical training is illustrated by the girls in Oiratia, one of the Asiatic sections of the Soviet Union. The Oirats are a primitive, nomadic people. When a Soviet Government was established there ten years ago, three innovations were stressed: emancipation of women, use of machinery, and sports and health care.

Young women went away to school, and returned to Oratia to lead in introducing modern sports and teaching health principles. Girls of Oiratia, in internationally styled sports clothes, now are thronging their own athletic fields.

A graphic picture of the sports interest of Russian women, of all ages and past experience, may be seen in the gymnastic classes. Ex-peasant women of sixty, in their home-embroidered aprons, headkerchiefs, and voluminous skirts, go through the drills beside little girls in short dresses and tall boot's. Every face is intent trying to understand these new kinds of movement. Every face is alert with interest.

AVe may talk of “mass athletics” in America, meaning by the comparatively new term those athletic events which are conducted for all those interested not just the stars. But the real meaning of “mass” athletics, the entire mass of a country’s people taking part, belong to the sports of the Soviet Union. '