The Olympic hopes of three Lithuanians were dashed when boarding the plane: “Ryanair” was stubborn and did not let them in” | Sports

The Olympic archery competition in Essen started on Sunday and continues on Monday without the Lithuanians.

Dalius Macernius, Modestas Šliauteris and Domantas Šuliokas were supposed to participate in the tournament on May 5-6 and try their luck to get to the Olympic Games in Paris.

However, hopes were dashed when boarding the plane in Kaunas.

Although the athletes had passed the inspection, they soon received information from the representatives of “Ryainair”, which operated the flight, that they could fly themselves, but the sports hoops registered in their luggage could not.

“Cry though: people can fly, but inventory can’t.” “Ryanair was stubborn and wouldn’t let them in – they showed the writing that they changed the rules from January 1st, and they say the bow as a weapon,” – 15 minutes said Gediminas Maksimavičius, president of the Lithuanian Archery Federation.

He did not hide that it was unpleasant and unexpected news for everyone.

Archers are accustomed to traveling to competitions by registering their bows as sporting equipment before their flights.

According to G. Maksimavičius, other airlines allow hoops to be flown, and Raynair flights used to fly with their own sports equipment.

“According to the laws of Lithuania, a bow is considered a weapon if its tension force exceeds 50 kilograms. Before them, the bow is not considered a weapon. The tension force of our bows is 17-20 kg, – explained G. Maksimavičius. “After all, the luggage had already passed through customs.”

The head of the Lithuanian Archery Federation said that the travel agency through which direct tickets to Germany were bought was not aware of Ryanair’s innovations.

“It is very unpleasant, because it is also a financial loss. Tickets, hotel, accreditations – over 2 thousand. euros. Who will cover? – G. Maksimavičius was indignant. – We will try to explain things to them, after all, we bought through an agency, they should have known. And we ordered the luggage separately.”

Lithuanian archers’ chances of entering the Olympic Games were not very high, but G. Maksimavičius estimated them at 50%: “The selection competitions, especially their play-off matches, are a lottery. I think it’s 50 to 50 that we could get in. In such competitions, everything is determined by psychology.”

The schedule of international archery competitions is arranged in such a way that the European Championship takes place immediately after the Olympic qualifying competition.

According to the plan, the same three Lithuanian archers were supposed to stay for the European Championship.

Now they and six other Lithuanian archery masters will compete only in the European Championships.

Other tickets and connecting flights were quickly found for the trip to the continental championship in Essen.

In addition to these three archers, Paulina Ramanauskaitė and Inga Timinskienė, Jonas Grigaravičius, Marius Grigaravičius and Rolandas Baranauskas will participate in the European Championship, which starts on Monday.