Vital Hurkou: I Do Not Expect Them To Invite Me Back To Team

The world champion will continue his career, but he does not expect to be invited to the national team.

Belarusian fighter, ycleped the “people’s champion,” Vital Hurkou, who at the May championships in Sweden became the 11-fold Muay Thai world champion, continues his career, but is not thinking about returning to the main national team.

“Firstly, I am happy with everything, and do not expect that I will be invited back into the team – he told BelaPAN. – Secondly, it would disrupt my music career.”

Vital Hurkou told that he is engaged in coaching and is planning to go on tour with the group Brutto. The athlete will get ready to participate in the next year’s World Games in Krakow, Poland. The victory in the world championship gave him this license. However, according to the “people's champion,” he will accept invitations to perform for Belarus.

In the next few days Hurkou is planning to dispose of the money that the public gathered on his trip to Sweden. He has not decided yet, on what kind of charity project to spend them, but he said that “it will be a useful and good one.”

We remind that Vital Hurkou’s performance in Sweden was in question. The athlete, who is a member of Siarhei Mikhalok’s musical project Brutto, won the national championship, but according to information published on the internet and the media, the Ministry of Sports refused to allocate funds for Vital Hurkou’s trip to the World Cup. Less than in one day Vital Hurkou’s fans gathered the necessary three thousand euro via the internet site, and the athlete fans and journalists began referring to him as the “people's champion.” After that the Ministry of Sports found money for Vital Hurkou’s trip and the fighter promised to pass the money, that had been raised, to a children's home.

In total at the World Cup, which was held from 18 to 28 May, the Belarusian athletes won ten medals, including five gold ones. Dzmitry Valent, Anatol Vanakau, Andrei Herasimchuk and Elena Leshkevich became champions as well.

The Belarusian national team also won one silver and four bronze medals. The “people's champion” was wearing a T-shirt with “Pahonia” and a national flag on his shoulders at the awards ceremony.