Elisabeta Lipe, president of the National Sports Agency (ANS), analyzed Romanian sports after a disappointing pre-Olympic year, with athletes winning just seven medals at the World Championships.

The Ministry of Sports, headed by Eduard Novak, was dissolved in June and replaced by the National Sports Agency, subordinate to the government and coordinated by the Romanian Prime Minister.

Multiple Olympic champion Elizabeth Lipe (58 years old) has been appointed as the head of the new Agency as president in the rank of state secretary. Chosen as the most valuable rower of the 20th century, Lipe was also the Minister of Youth and Sports from 2015 to 2017, writes Agerpres.

Romanian sports in decline: “We woke up to reality”, says Elisabeta Lipa

“This year kind of showed us where we are after 2022 with very good results for Romanian sport. He showed us what the disciplines are and what we can expect at the Olympics next year.

Because this year, Romania won only 7 medals at the World Championships, the competition where all the valuable athletes of the world meet. Depending on the World Cup, you can organize an Olympic year.

Compared to 2022, it is obvious that in 2023, Romanian sports are declining. This year, when all countries gave their best in the field of sports, here we woke up to reality, we have 7 medals at the World Championship. We leave these 7 medals and see what else can be built before the Olympic Games in Paris. Although time is very, very little” – Elizaveta Lypapresident of ANS, in an interview for Agerpres.

Elisabeth Lipe says it took her five months to solve the problems left by the Ministry of Sports

Lipe said that the problems at the level of the Ministry of Sports, transformed into the National Sports Agency since June, are quite big. She said that it took her five months to sort them out.

“There were problems in Romanian sports this year and they continue. We started 2023 very optimistically, with the “biggest budget” in the history of the Ministry of Sports, which in three months did not reach anyone. And three months says a lot.

Then in June I became head of the National Sports Agency and at the time I thought all the rumors I heard were jokes. But when I woke up to the fact that it had come true, I really couldn’t believe that we could stoop so low.

I have been at the head of the ANS for six months, but it took five months to bring all the problems to a common denominator. And only in the sixth month, people were able to receive a salary on the day established by law, that is, on the 10th.

There were large debts in the sense that salaries were secured for six months, after which, when requests came, money was transferred, thus from one quarter to another, to ensure timely payments, after which it was impossible to do anything. And then we had the support of the Prime Minister, in the sense that we had a reserve fund for sports events in clubs and federations. Because in June, when I arrived, the federations and clubs handed me the keys. And then we had another salary reserve fund and we covered salaries until the end of the year.

Sportsmen’s championships are not relevant, but they will be relevant. Not all, because we have a prize fund of 90 million lei. Therefore, clearly no one will provide this prize fund. But there will be a certain sorting, there will be certain priorities, and immediately after entering the new year, we will also provide awards” – Elizaveta Lypa.

Romania wants to win 13 medals at the 2024 Olympics

In 2024, the National Sports Agency aims to support, in the first half of the year, especially the Olympic federations in preparation for the Olympic Games in Paris.

“The tasks of the National Sports Agency in the new year are very clear, to be able to support the Olympic federations first of all in order to present themselves as worthy as possible at the Olympic Games, because the goal of the ANS is not to win medals, the federations have set medals as their goals.

At the Olympic Forum, which we had recently, the federations assumed winning 13 medals in Paris. Therefore, if this happens in reality, God forbid, we will lose the 45-46 place we are in (no – in the ranking of nations from the Olympics in Tokyo).

We currently have 61 athletes who have qualified for Paris, but there are others who are continuing to qualify. Of course, however, without the sports games team, the Romanian delegation will not be very large in Paris. But I want it to be valuable. Numerically everything is fine, if the value is wrong” – Elizaveta Lypa.

In 2024, the money will be directed to federations that promise medals at the 2024 Olympics

With regard to the budget for next year, the president noted that the federations that missed the qualification for the Olympics in Paris will feel this in terms of funding.

“The federations that did not qualify for Paris will certainly feel this shortfall in the 2024 budget because they have no target. The financial potential next year will be directed mostly to those federations that promise medals. After that, in descending order, we’ll see how we’re doing.

Of course, we will draw up budgets together with COSR, because we are talking about Olympic funding. And I am telling you right now that there will not be a single federation that will not be able to achieve its goal in Paris because of a lack of funding. That’s true.

The ANS budget is 571 million, but this also includes 67 million for COSR. It’s clearly under budget and we can’t get a budget adjustment because the Olympics start in July. Therefore, the budget of federations with medal potential should be provided for the first half of the year” – Elizaveta Lypa.

The best Romanian athletes of 2023: Simona Radis and Ancuta Bodnar at the top

In the 2023 top athletes ranking, Elisabeth Lipe listed world champions in rowing, as well as Catalin Cirila in canoeing, Bernadette Shox in table tennis and David Popovici in swimming.

“Now I will say that I am subjective, but this is only a personal opinion. This year’s results must be taken into account when compiling the rating. And the results are very clear, rowing has two world titles and European titles.

So at the top will be the crew of Simona Radis and Ankuca Bodnar, who are unbeaten in 26 consecutive races in double sculls, and the 8+1 crew, who have revised the figures since 2022.

Then there would be Katalin Cirila, who has silver in the Olympic 1000m single sculls…he is an athlete with great medal potential in Paris. Similarly, Bernadette Schock has shown very good results in table tennis, as has David Popovich, from whom we have high expectations.

In any case, we all want next year to have so many good results that it will be very, very difficult for us to make a rating of the best athletes in the end” – Elizaveta Lypa.

Medals won by Romania at the 2023 World Cup

Rowing – WC Belgrade – 5 medals

• gold in women’s double rowing (Ankuca Bodnar, Simona Radish)

• gold in the women’s category 8+1 (Magdalena Rusu, Roxana Angel, Adriana Adam, Iuliana Bugush, Madalina Beres, Maria Tivodariu, Ioana Vrincanu, Amalia Beres, Victoria-Stefania Petreanu)

• silver in the women’s foursome (Medalina Beres, Maria Tivodariou, Magdalena Rusu and Amalia Beres)

• bronze in women’s doubles (Ioana Vrinchanou and Roxana Angel)

• bronze in women’s double rowing, light category (Mariana-Laura Dumitru and Ionela Kozmiyuk).

Kayak-canoe – CM Duisburg – 1 medal

• silver in 1000 m single canoe, Olympic attempt (Cătălin Chirilă)

Weightlifting – CM Riyadh – 1 medal

• bronze to pinch style, cat. 49 kg (Michaela Cambey)