Brazilian athletes of six sport disciplines are getting ready for the new Olympic cycle at the Team Brazil Training Centre in Barra, Rio de Janeiro’s west zone. The Training Centre also hosts the Russian synchro team and the Japanese artistic gymnastics team.

The Russian synchro team is visiting Brazil for the seventh time. Formed by 12 athletes, the team is coached by Tatiana Pokrovskaya, who led the team in the conquest of the fourth championship from Sydney 2000 to London 2012. Russians and Brazilians will train together until 12 February in the same place.

The Japanese artistic gymnastics team, coached by Takashi Kobayashi, will hold its last training session at the Training Centre. They will return to Tokyo this coming Friday. The joint training sessions held by the Brazilian team and the Japanese team, which already won 95 Olympic medals, started one week ago.

According to Leonardo Finco, the coordinator of the Brazilian men’s artistic gymnastics team, “exchanging experiences is essential, since the Japanese team has an excellent technical level”. The Brazilian team now prepares to compete in 2013 in March in Berlin.

Acquatics marathon athletes, swimmers, a sailor (Patricia Fontes), athletics teams and the Brazilian judo team, formed by 43 athletes, are also improving their performances in the Training Centre. They highlight the importance of interacting with top-performance athletes and coaches in the most diverse sport disciplines.

“The Team Brazil Training Centre is well structured, which is very important. With a good training centre, our team is ready to start competing and do a great job. These are top-quality facilities; the tatami is very good, the gym is complete”, affirmed Olympic medalist in London 2012, Felipe Kitadai.

With capacity to meet the needs of all Olympic disciplines, the Training Centre offers a gym, a modern weight training room, a warm-up room, a multi-use area, a physiotherapy office and medical offices.