In recent years, young Mongolians have begun achieving success in new sports that are developing in the country. One of them is Ts.Khuselbayar, an International Master of Sports and athlete of the Mongolian Swing Federation, who has practiced in pull-up bar sports for several years and made his mark at international competitions.

At the Calisthenics World Championship 2026, organized by the World Street Workout and Calisthenics Federation in Riga, Latvia, he won a silver medal in the lightweight freestyle category. The organizers praised the Mongolian athlete’s high level of preparation, skills and flawless execution of elements, noting that he had reached a level where he could compete on an equal footing with the world’s top athletes. His achievement has inspired young people who practice the sport.

Following the championship, he traveled to Moscow, Russia, where he was invited to compete in the 10th Steel Brothers Calisthenics Cup organized by the Steel Brothers Team.

You attracted considerable attention after winning a silver medal as part of the Mongolian team at the Calisthenics World Championship. How long have you been involved in this sport, and what achievements have you made?

I was born and raised in Orkhon Province and am now 24 years old. In addition to serving as the head of the Mongolian Swing Federation, I represent Mongolia at international competitions.

People commonly refer to “turnik” as a Russian word. There is currently no official Mongolian name for it, but I was told that its literal meaning is related to “swinging”. That is why we named our association the Mongolian Savluurt Duulegchdiin Kholboo or Mongolian Swing Federation.

Before me, members of the older generation had established an association and operated for a period of time, but its activities were suspended about five years ago. Since then, I have worked together with U.Saranmunkh to re-establish the association, and we have now been operating for our fourth year.

As for me, I have been practicing the sport for eight years. This was my second time competing at the World Championship. Last year, I competed for the first time in Bulgaria together with four athletes from our federation. This time, six of us traveled to Riga, Latvia.

I was the only member of our team to win a silver medal, while two others finished fourth, so I believe we achieved respectable results. By taking part in competitions like these, we gain experience from one event to another, observe other athletes and learn a great deal.

Athletes from each country have their own distinctive strengths. Turnik involves both strength and rotational elements. Mongolian athletes are somewhat behind competitors from other countries when it comes to strength-based elements, but we tend to excel at rotational elements. I noticed this particularly well during this competition.

However, we tried to make up for our weaknesses with our strengths. If our athletes work more on their speed and strength than before, we can compete on an equal footing with athletes from any country.

Three of the six members of the Mongolian team were competing at the World Championship for the first time, so they were understandably nervous and intimidated. One of them competed in the pull-up category, while the other five competed in freestyle.

Latvia is five hours behind Mongolia. When the competition took place at around 5:00 a.m. Mongolian time, young people who practice turnik gathered together to watch and support our athletes competing at the World Championship. On the day I won my medal, everyone was incredibly excited, and the gym where we train was packed with people.

What was the first thought that came to your mind when you competed with the world’s best and stood on the podium?

I don’t consider people’s expectations and hopes for me particularly important. In some ways, they can add psychological pressure and become a burden. I focus on working on myself. Many things can happen to athletes during a competition. You cannot predict the circumstances—the luck you will have that day, your physical and psychological condition, or which competitors you will face. If I have the opportunity and ability, I will try to improve my results. If I cannot, I will work harder toward my goal again. Nothing ends with a single competition. Rather than forcing myself to achieve a certain result and putting unnecessary pressure on myself, I believe there is no need to burden myself mentally.

The moment that left the strongest impression on me was the competition before receiving the medal. In particular, it was the moment when I qualified for the final, competed against the best athletes, successfully completed my freestyle routine without making mistakes and showed everything I was capable of. At that moment, I thought a lot about the eight years of consistent hard work I had put in.

Among the competitors in the lightweight freestyle category, Finland’s Samu Kononen won the gold medal and Belgium’s Thomas Ansotte took the bronze medal, while Mongolia’s N.Ankhbayar finished fourth.

We also really liked Latvia’s cool weather and climate, which were similar to those in Mongolia. During our stay, we enjoyed the quiet and peaceful surroundings, and even found it refreshing simply to take a deep breath. The people there also appeared to be tall and well-built. Before returning home, we had a great time exploring Riga and getting to know the city.

I used to think that pull-up bar exercises were mainly practiced by military and armed forces personnel because of the nature of their work. Now we are seeing it develop into a sport, with professional athletes representing Mongolia and achieving success at international competitions.

When I was a high school student, I started practicing on the pull-up bar simply out of personal interest rather than viewing it as a sport or competitive activity. At that time, there was very little information or knowledge about the sport.

I used to exercise on the pull-up bar outside my school for a few minutes before classes started and continued after school. I also practiced some basic and relatively easy elements, such as the back lever, “hand snake” and “leg snake”, which my father and grandfather used to perform when they were young.

One day, I watched a video of a World Championship on YouTube. After that, I began researching the sport and discovered that competitions were being held in many countries around the world. That was when I became truly interested in pull-up bar sports. Over the past few years, I have also participated in competitions held domestically.

From what I have observed, freestyle seems to attract young people’s interest more than other types of pull-up bar exercises.

There is no age limit in pull-up bar sports. People who want to develop their physical strength often practice in the pull-up category. Freestyle, on the other hand, attracts a lot of attention from Mongolian young people because it is both interesting and risky, as well as visually impressive. Many of them become passionate about it.

Pull-up bar sport is constantly evolving. Somewhere in the world, some athlete is always creating new elements. Therefore, there is no strict rule saying that a particular element must be performed in exactly one way. Athletes can modify and develop elements according to their individual characteristics and styles.

When performing a self-created routine to music, athletes select the elements and arrange them in a way that allows them to earn the highest possible score. The more difficult the elements they perform, the higher their score.

It is similar to dancing—you learn and collect different movements. The athlete who can perform the most interesting elements within the time limit and in sync with the music is declared the winner.

We are discussing ways to enrich the elements in our routines going forward. For example, if I am not very good at performing a particular type of element, another athlete may be able to perform what I cannot. Every athlete has weaknesses. Therefore, I have evaluated my own performance and started working on my weaknesses.

Immediately after returning from the World Championship, I continued training in preparation for an international competition held in Moscow, Russia. One athlete from each country was invited to participate in the competition.

These days, parents tend to research the sports their children are interested in before enrolling them. How expensive is turnik as a sport?

Young people interested can practice it without spending much money. There are pull-up bars outside apartment buildings in districts across Ulaanbaatar. One of its advantages is that people of all ages can practice for free at any time throughout the year. Some young people install wall-mounted pull-up bars at home and train there during the winter. When it comes to achieving success in sports, passion, dedication and effort play a major role.

The sport greatly develops a person’s ability to react quickly. First, it takes less than a second to complete a rotation in the air. Second, it takes only about 50–60 milliseconds to release the bar and grab it again. Although 0.5 seconds may seem extremely short, the human nervous system works even faster. Successfully completing an element within this brief period depends on the athlete’s skill.

A beginner may be able to release and catch the bar after one rotation, while an experienced athlete can do it after two. At an exceptionally high level, an athlete can release and catch the bar after three rotations. If even a small technical mistake occurs while completing four rotations, there is a risk of hitting the bar and falling, being thrown away from it, or even suffering an injury.

Therefore, it is a sport that develops what you might call a “sixth sense” to a very high level within an extremely short period of time.

Although it involves physical training, it also develops the mind. Can it therefore be considered similar to an intellectual sport?

Yes. When practicing the pull-up bar sports, you do not simply perform individual elements. Combining and arranging them into a routine and performing it to music also gives the sport an extreme-sports aspect.

It is easy to encounter various obstacles during training and competitions. Athletes may suffer torn skin on their hands or soft-tissue injuries, so it is important to carefully consider both the risks and the benefits.

In turnik, an athlete can perform more than 20 elements in a single minute, including 10 rotational elements, six grip elements and dismounts. To master just one element, an athlete may attempt and repeat it thousands of times.

For me, when preparing a one-minute routine, I lost count of how many thousands of times I practiced the approximately 20 elements involved. Depending on the difficulty of an element, I have sometimes spent three months learning it. For the more difficult ones, I have trained for six months and, in some cases, four to five years until I could fully master them.

You can spend as much time learning a single element as you would spend earning two university degrees. Athletes work extremely hard so that they can perform an element flawlessly in just a few seconds at the World Championship.

I have heard that you work as a coach while also competing in domestic and international competitions. How do you manage everything, including running your association, organizing competitions and training athletes?

For the past three years since establishing the association, I have been coaching children and young people aged 10 to 17 who are interested in practicing, in addition to my own training.

I observe and study all the techniques and elements, perform them myself and master them before teaching them to children and sharing my experience with them. They say that a person learns throughout their entire life. The more you learn, the more knowledge you accumulate in areas such as nutrition, psychology, training and the ability to cope with the demands of competition.

Sports are often nonprofit, so those who are passionate and dedicated are the ones who drive their development forward. My goal is not simply to develop my skills, but also to encourage people to adopt an active lifestyle.

I am the only person in my family who practices a sport. When I am busy with work, sometimes even 24 hours in a day does not feel like enough. In addition to participating in association-wide activities each month and each season, I travel abroad to compete in international competitions twice a year. My work, my life and my goals are all connected to sport.

Over the past few years, I have faced challenges that could have made me want to give up, but I never considered quitting. Even when something seemed difficult or impossible to accomplish that day, I would tell myself, “I can do it tomorrow,” and keep working.

In sports, you need courage and a clear goal to achieve success. Today’s children and young people have every opportunity to learn, explore and pursue the things they aspire to accomplish.