Aleksandr Shlychkov is a Russian sporting, public and cultural figure. He is President of the European Lethwei Federation, the European Para-Taekwondo Union, member of the Para-Taekwondo Governing Board of the World Taekwondo Federation, founder of the Men of Spirit charitable foundation for supporting, strengthening and promoting healthy life styles and chairman of the Link of Times non-commercial organization for developing and supporting national traditions, culture and art.
Biography
Aleksandr Shlychkov was born in Ust-Labinsk, Krasnodar Krai. At school, he joined a Greco-Roma wrestling group trained by Vladimir Alekhin, honoured coach of Russia. After finishing school, he entered the Suvorov Military School in Moscow. He continued his studies at the Donetsk higher military-political school. During his studies, he trained in a karate group led by Valery Medvedev and Sergei Lapshin, won a prize at the Ukrainian karate Championship, is a Candidate Master of Sports in Karate and black belt. From 1983-1985, Aleksandr Shlychkov served with the limited contingent of Soviet forces in Afghanistan. In 1986, he took part in recovery work in response to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident. He retired from the armed forces for health reasons with the rank of captain. In 1990, Shlychkov headed the Centre for Crime Prevention under the Voronezh Regional Committee of the Voronezh Komsomol. In the late 1980s, Shlychkov organized and headed the Voronezh regional Shield martial arts school, where he actively developed and promoted martial arts.
Taekwondo
From 1990 to March 1991, he worked as an intern at the Department of Karate in one of Korea’s leading universities - the Kyung Hee University. Aleksandr Shlychkov has been Head of the Voronezh Regional Federation of Taekwondo WTF, one of the leading federations in the Russian Taekwondo Union, since 1991. Between 2004-2010 the federation was the most successful sports federation in Voronezh Oblast. The Voronezh Oblast team won the Russian Championship four times in the team standings, the Cup of Russia five times, and the women’s team won the Cup of Russia nine times. The federation has more than 2000 active members of different ages and social groups. It has trained nine international level masters of sport, more than 150 masters of sport of Russia, more than 3500 general athletes and 450 black belt holders. The federation has more than fifty coaches, three of whom are honoured trainers of Russia, seven republican level judges and international judges. Since 2010, Shlychkov has been involved in promoting a healthy lifestyle and encouraging people with disabilities to take up sport. After setting up the Russian Federation of Taekwondo for Persons with Physical Disabilities he was appointed its vice-president, before becoming president in 2013. In 2011, at the first European Championship, the Russian team took first place with five gold, five silver and five bronze medals. In 2012, Aleksandr Shlychkov was appointed Head of the European Para-Taekwondo Union. His main task at that time was to get para-taekwondo included in the Paralympic Games. One of his key achievements was the inclusion of para-taekwondo in the program of the Paralympic games in Tokyo in 2020. The première of the Strong in Spirit film about para-taekwondo was shown in December 2013, on the eve of the 11th Paralympic Games held in 2014 in Sochi. The film was directed by Andrei Nikishin and produced by Aleksandr Shlychkov. During work on the film, which showed that people with disabilities are also human beings who can achieve great results through their own efforts, the idea to set up a charitable foundation was born. In March 2014, Aleksandr Shlychkov became Head of the Spirit of Manpublic organization, which aims to provide comprehensive support for people with disabilities and to promote and strengthen a healthy lifestyle. Aleksandr Shlychkov was appointed to the Para-Taekwondo Governing Board of the World Taekwondo Federation in 2015.
Cultural activities
Aleksandr Shlychkov is the founder and one of the organizers of the first European Festival of private collections "History Without Borders” in the cities of Liepāja, Riga and Jelgava. He owns a collection of photographs by Voldemars Andersons. Under the auspices of the Link of Times non-commercial organization for developing and supporting national traditions, culture and art, he organized an exhibition of the Latvian artist and photographer in 2016 in Moscow: In the Vortex of History. The Fate of a Latvian Rifleman. The exhibition opened 20 September 2016 in the Margarita Rudomino All-Russia State Library for Foreign Literature. The opening was attended by Ineta Celmiņa, the Deputy Ambassador of the Republic of Latvia; the artist Nikas Safronov; Vadim Duda, General Director of the Library for Foreign Literature and Alexei Nefedov, President of Jugra Bank, etc. More than 10,000 people visited the exhibition. Aleksandr Shlychkov is also the co-author with Alexander Nikishin of a unique publishing project dedicated to the 170th anniversary of the birth of Pyotr Sorokoumovsky “Russian fur. An Illustrated History. He is the producer and co-author of the international project “History of Riga Black Balsam”.
