Athlete of the Week on RRI - Valentin Crețu

In recent years, Romanian athletes have been grabbing good results in winter sports. Whereas in skiing and biathlon events progress seems to be slower, our athletes are closing in to world rankings in bob sledding and sleigh events. In the latest Winter Olympics hosted by Beijing, Romania's luge team made up of Raluca Strămăturaru, Valentin Creţu and the Marian Gîtlan / Darius Șerban tandem ranked 9. In the women's singles, Andreea Grecu ranked 12, while the men's 4-man bobsleigh crew made up of Mihai Tentea, Raul Dobre, Ciprian Daroczi and Cristian Radu finished the competition in 13th place.

Last Tuesday, in the relay team at the World Cup in Altenberg, Germany, Romania ranked 6. Competing were Raluca Strămăturaru, Valentin Crețu and the pair made up of Ștefan Handaric and Sebastian Motzca. The greatest achievement came on Friday, however, when Valentin Crețu won the Nations Cup, held in Winterberg on the sidelines of the World Cup. Crețu won the men's singles with 52.412 seconds, followed closely by Florian Müller of Germany and Jonathan Eric Gustafson of the USA. For this result, we have designated Valentin Crețu Athlete of the Week on RRI.

Valentin Crețu was born September 9, 1989 in Sinaia, a city located at the foothills of Bucegi Mountains, which are famous for their slopes. He is enrolled at the local sports club. In 2004 he was drafted into Romania's national team, and starting the 2006-2007 season has been competing in World Cup events. Valentin Crețu has so far qualified to four editions of the Olympics Games - in 2010 in Vancouver, in 2014 in Sochi, in 2018 in PyeongChang and in 2022 in Beijing. His objective is securing qualification to the 2026 Olympics to be hosted by Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo in Italy. (VP)