THE THIRD BICYCLE FESTIVAL "KARAGANDA-VELOCITY 2010"

Once again the “Karaganda Velocity” festival, dedicated to the World Environmental day, took place in Karaganda on 6 June 2010. That was already the third time when cyclists of Karaganda city and its vicinities got a great opportunity to treadle in the circle of friends, participate in various contests and get valuable prizes as well as lots of fun from the event on the whole.

The Bike festival was organized in an effort to popularize bicycle as the most ecological means of transportation and was one more attempt to focus public attention on the problem of environmental pollution, as well as necessity of forming cycling infrastructure in Karaganda city. It’s important to note that in 2010 the bicycle-oriented events were held simultaneously in Almaty, Karaganda and Pavlodar on 6 May, this fact graphically shows increase of interest of the Kazakhstani people in cycling.

“Biker’s booklet” – a flier, published by “The Velo-Almaty” initiative group of cyclists with the help of the US Department of State - was distributed in the framework of the event. The flier, issued in Kazakh and Russian languages, tells in an accessible form about bicycle traffic rules and structure of bicycle, as well as gives a lot of practical pieces of advice, concerning cyclist’s behaviour on road.

This time programme of the Karaganda bike festival consisted of several parts: bicycles march, contests and floor show. At first participants of the bike festival escorted by the cars of road traffic police rode in an orderly manner from the New victory park to the central square of the Park for recreation and leisure.

Then the festival continued on the central square of the Park for recreation and leisure. The participants and guests of the festival were greeted by the head of the department of nature conservation programmes of “Department of natural resources and environmental management” Nikolay N.Golyev, head of the department of “The center of healthy lifestyle development” Vladimir F. Agarkov and coach of the cycling section by the “Shahtyor” stadium Anatoliy Maslennikov.

Next came the contests, in which 46 people took part. During the “Race” contest participants were required to ride around the big lake counter-clockwise as fast as possible. The “Figure cycling” contest checked the participants’ ability to ride fast and carefully at the same time. In this contest they had to ride between the tires, which were laid out on the ground, as fast as possible without stepping on the ground and riding into the tires.

In the framework of the traditional contest “Find a bottle” (by the way, it was traditionally the most ecological contest on the festival agenda) participants were given time to find and bring to the park stage as many empty bottles, polluting the territory of the park, as possible. Within 5 minutes the participants managed to gather about 250 glass bottles, thereby cleaning up the park.

According to the results of the contests the following participants became winners and were awarded valuable prizes:

Subgroup M 14+ (boys older than 14 years old)
I. Opanasyuk Oleg
II. Nurutdinov Mars
III. Mihaylov Vitaliy

Subgroup M 14- (boys younger than 14 years old)
I. Shapovalov Oleg
II. Fenyak Ivan
III. Sheryayev Daniil

Subgroup Zh (girls of all ages)
I. Manturova Yevgeniya
II. Filyarovskaya Viktoriya
III. Zhanakbayeva Aliya

The oldest and the youngest participants of the contests (Nurutdinov Mars, 46 years old and Turtbayev Alisher, 10 years old) were also given memorable recognition gifts.

The additional prize was also given to Roman Kim – a participant of “the Tilting match” contest, which was held in addition to the “Figure cycling” contest.



While bicycle-lovers were competing in speed riding and challenged each other, the children’s asphalt drawing competition, also dedicated to the World Environmental day, was held nearby. According to the results of the competition 6 children became winners: German Dima (Ist prize), Ibrayeva Dalida (IInd prize), Baylova Akniyet (IIIrd prize) (age category from 2 to 6 years old), Ilyin Sasha (Ist prize), Sadatkarimov Yerzhab (IInd prize) and Tsoy Kirill (IIIrd prize) (age cateogory from 7 to 14 years old).

During and after the contests participants and guests of the bike festival were entertained by the “Urvolk” and “MetaFolk Inc.” music bands, which performed under the aegis of “Across the Universe” club of art music.

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Mass-media about "Karaganda-VeloCity 2010" ...>

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The festival was organized by “Karaganda Regional Ecological Museum” NGO, “Center for Introduction of New Environmentally Safe Technologies” (“CINEST”) public foundation, “Avalon” Historico-geographical society and public foundation, Cycling Section by the “Shahtyor” stadium.

The bike festival was organized with financial support from the Department of natural resources and environmental management of Karaganda oblast, The Nura-Sarysu department of ecology and the US Department of State.

The following organizations also provided cooperation in the festival organization: the Department of the parks for Recreation and Leisure, the Road police department of the Internal Affairs department of Karaganda oblast, Road police department of the Department of internal affairs of Karaganda city, the Board of health of Karaganda oblast, A. Maslennikov cycling workshop, “Across the Universe” club of art music with “Urvolk” and “MetaFolk inc.” music bands, “Ayza” LLC, “Belyayeva” private interpreneur.

The organizers of the festival would like to express special gratitude to all the above mentioned individuals and organizations.



Dear friends, we’re looking forward to seeing you again at the “Karaganda-Velocity 2011”!

Photos by Dariya Komleva