The third World Cup of the 2010 World Cup Series is taking place in Wroclaw, Poland, this upcoming week-end.  This Wroclaw World Cup will follow the World Cups held in Ghent, Belgium, on April 9-10, and Davos, Switzerland, on June 11-12.  The four other World Cups of the 2010 World Cup Series will take place in Albacete, Spain, on September 3-4, Astrakhan, Russia, on September 17-18, Loule, Portugal, on September 24-25, and Salzgitter, Germany, on October 8-9.

This 2010 Wroclaw World Cup will take place at the Orbita Hall arena, a superb and modern arena.  Training sessions started yesterday with an open training practice.  Today was the day of specific trainings.  The preliminaries in individual trampoline and synchronized trampoline will take place on Saturday, July 3, 2010.  On Sunday July the 4th, the finals will be held.  No tumbling event will take place at this World Cup.

The organization of the event has been top notch so far, and the delegations were greeted very warmly. 

Based on today's training, the level of the competition will be very high despite the absence of some top nations like China and Canada.

Overall, 56 athletes from 13 countries will compete in trampoline at this 2010 Wroclaw World Cup.  These countries include Algeria, Belarus, Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Russia, and Uzbekistan. 

This Wroclaw World Cup will be the second World Cup ever held in the Lower Silesia city.  The 2008 edition of the event, held in connection with the Wroclaw Cup, was won by Dimitri Ushakov (RUS) and Irina Karavaeva (RUS).  Overall, it will be the fifth trampoline World Cup ever held in Poland.  The first one took place in 1998 in Poznan, and saw the victories of Evgeni Beliaev (BLR) and Irina Karavaeva (RUS).  The 2007 Zielona Gora World Cup saw the victories of Lu Chunlong (CHN) and Irina Karavaeva (RUS).  The 2009 Zielona Gora World Cup saw Lu Chunlong (CHN) and Huang Shanshan (CHN) emerge as the winners.  A tumbling only World Cup also took place in Poland in November 1996 in Swidnica. 

The city of Wroclaw will also host the next European Championships in trampoline, tumbling, and double mini-trampoline on April 10-16, 2012.  The Orbita Hall of Wroclaw will also host the upcoming World Championships in acrobatic gymnastics in two weeks. 

The favorites in the women's individual trampoline competition of this 2010 Wroclaw World Cup should include 2004 Olympic Champion and 2001 World Champion Anna Dogonadze (GER), who recently captured the silver medal at the European Championships and the bronze medal at the Davos World Cup, 2008 Olympic bronze medalist and 2010 Ghent World Cup winner Ekaterina Khilko (UZB), 2-time European Championship medalist Tatiana Petrenia (BLR), 2010 European bronze medalist Galina Goncharenko (RUS), Anna Savkina (UZB), Andrea Lenders (NED), and 2006 European Youth Champion Ana Rente (POR).  Potential outsiders with a chance at the final, and possibly a medal could also include Laura Gallagher (GBR), Anastasia Velichko (RUS), Ekaterina Mironova (BLR), Natalia Kolesnikova (RUS), Lara Hueninghake (GER), 2007 Zielona Gora World Cup medalist and local hope Agnieszka Stanek (POL), and Carina Baumgaertner (GER).

The men's individual trampoline competition has a few favorites including European Champion and Ghent World Cup winner Gregoire Pennes (FRA), European silver medalist and 2-time European Youth Champion Mikhail Melnik (RUS), 2008 Wroclaw World Cup winner Dimitri Ushakov (RUS), and European bronze medalist Viacheslav Model (BLR).  Many other trampolinists are likely to join the battle for the medals including Sebastien Martiny (FRA), Daniel Schmidt (GER), Peter Jensen (DEN), James Higgins (GBR), 2-time World silver medalist Nikolai Kazak (BLR), Diogo Ganchinho (POR), Takashi Sakamoto (JPN), and Sergei Chumak (RUS).  The finals could also feature any of the members of the young Japanese team made of Kazuma Takahashi (JPN), Ryota Shimada (JPN), and Katsufumi Tasaki (JPN).  Other potential finalists could include Dennis Luxon (GER), Nuno Merino (POR), Daniel Praest (DEN), Christopher Schuepferling (GER), local hope Lukasz Tomaszewski (POL), Dimitri Fedorovsky (RUS), Romain Legros (FRA) or Fernando Gotschin (NED).   

Today was a very hot day in Wroclaw, which is a very charming city with a spectacular historic downtown area.   

AcrobaticSports.com is covering the event with a two-person crew featuring Damien Dorna and Michel Bontemps. 

Link to the official website

AcrobaticSports.com would like to thank Konrad Bojakowski and the whole Wroclaw Cup team for their assistance and support.