TIRANA, May 26 – Three former Albanian athletes will represent the United States, Australia and Bulgaria in the Rio 2016 Olympics where Albania will be participating with a reduced number of athletes.
Shooter Enkeleda Shehaj is returning to the Olympics after two decades to represent the U.S. after the 1996 Atlanta participation as an Albanian athlete.
Shehaj, 47, who has been living in the U.S. since 1999 worked her way up to a fourth-place finish in a World Cup competition in 1991 and earned a place on Albania’s team for the 1992 Barcelona Games. It marked the nation’s first Olympic appearance since 1972 and since the end of communism. She finished 14th, 15th and 21st in three Olympic events between 1992 and 1996.
Shehaj’s goal is to perform at her best at an Olympics for the first time. She remembers succumbing to the increased pressure in Barcelona and Atlanta and not shooting precisely.
“Who doesn’t want to have a last shot in the Olympic Games?” Shehaj said. “I will try to do [my] best. If that happens, I’ll be the happiest person,” she told NBC Sports.
Former Albania freestyle wrestler Sahit Prizreni has also qualified to represent Australia in the Rio Olympics.
With numerous international titles to his name, Prezreni was the pride of Albanian wrestling, competing at the Athens 2004 Olympics and being selected to carry his country’s flag at the Opening Ceremony of the Beijing Games. The Victorian will now feature in the green and gold at Rio, after becoming an Australian citizen in 2014.
Thirty-three year-old Prizreni who competes in the 65kg weight division, proved he could match it with the best when he won a bronze medal at the 2007 Wresting World Championships. A few years later he claimed a silver medal at the European Championships in 2011.
After devoting 20 years of his career to Albanian wrestling, he moved to Australia and became an Australian citizen in 2014, causing some upset in his birth nation.
“I’ve given 20 years of my youth to Albanian wrestling but I think I’ve done more than everyone else in other sports so they have no choice but to accept my decision,” he told SBS News.
Another former Albanian wrestler, Elis Guri will represent Bulgaria in the Summer Olympics. Thirty-two-year-old Guri who left Albania in 2009, qualified after finishing fifth in the 98 kg Greco-Roman category in Los Angeles Wrestling World Championship.
Albania is expected to send a limited number of athletes to the Rio 2016 Olympics after a doping scandal in late 2014 that saw three weightlifters banned.
With preparations already underway, Luiza Gega is the only athlete to have qualified for the Olympic Games after finishing first in the Women’s 1500 meters in the Baku 2015 European Games.
“For the first time Albania received a medal in an Olympic event such as the European Games. The gold medal won by Luiza Gega makes us optimistic about Rio 2016,” says Viron Bezhani, the president of the Albanian Olympic Committee.
Gega, 27, will Albania’s flag bearer in the Rio Olympics. She has also been financially tempted to represent Turkey.
“I had offers from Turkey but I didn’t want to leave,” said Gega who is Albania’s only hope for a top finish in summer Olympics.
An internationally successful athlete, runner Luiza Gega won a 1500m silver medal at the 2013 Mediterranean Games and a 1500m bronze medal at the 2013 Universiade.
Officials of the National Olympic Committee say Albania could send only six athletes to the Rio 2016, almost half of its number in the previous London and Beijing Olympics. Four athletes, including two runners and swimmers, have already received invitations while no other athlete, including expected weightlifters, managed to qualify for the Olympic event.
In late 2014, Albania’s weightlifting was hit by a doping scandal which saw three weightlifters, two of whom medal winners at the world weightlifting championship in Kazakhstan, suspended for testing positive for banned substances.
Weightlifting has traditionally been Albania’s best performing sport in international competitions.
The London 2012 was Albania’s sixth participation in the Olympic Games since its debut in 1972. Albania sent a team of four shooters and a weightlifter to the Munich 1972 Olympic Games but the team did not reappear at the Olympic Games until 1992 when the communist regime collapsed.
In 1972, Albania’s Ymer Pampuri broke the Olympic record for the press at featherweight and finished ninth overall. More recently, Ilirjan Suli finished fifth in the men’s middleweight category at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games and Romela Begaj was sixth in the women’s lightweight at Beijing 2008. In Beijing, Albania’s team of 11 was the largest in their history.
More than 10,000 athletes from 206 countries will be participating in the 2016 Summer Olympics that will be held in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro from August 5 to 21. Kosovo is also making its debut participation after becoming a member of International Olympic Committee in late 2014.
