Cycling:
The United States’ Secretary of State, John Kerry, is not your average cyclist. The 72-year-old Kerry is a dedicated athlete and his cycling adventures include rides during Tour de France which included climbs like Alpe d’Huez and Mont Ventoux, the latter ascent is known for its rocky and moonscape-like summit.
Kerry has taken along his bike during his official travels as Secretary of State. During earlier negotiations on the Iran deal in March, Kerry was photographed in Lausanne, Switzerland with his bike.
According to the publication The Wall Street Journal Kerry was riding atop an orange Serotta bike outfitted with carbon-fiber Zipp wheels. It costs more than several thousand dollars.
Photography:
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev is fond of photography. Talking about photography he said that for him the basic meaning of the photo itself, which is a special art form, is that it depicts sadness about that speck of time that will never return.
Recalling when he started his hobby, Medvedev said that he started about thirty-five years ago using a soviet camera called ‘Smena-8M’. It was one of the most basic cameras which had to be operated manually.
Since then, Medvedev has used various cameras for photography including Nikon, Canon and Leica M9.
Boxing:
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is a skilled boxer. He used to practice boxing with his father while growing up.
The practice paid off when he defeated conservative senator Patrick Brazeau in a charity boxing match.
The Prime Minister during his three-day visit to New York in April, to sign the Paris climate treaty, managed to go boxing with Yuri Foreman, a professional boxer at the famous Gleason’s Gym in Brooklyn.
Muhammad Ali trained at Gleason’s Gym for his famous fight with Sonny Liston.
Golf:
US President Barack Obama regularly plays golf. According to online publication Salon, “Obama famously plays a lot of golf mostly on weekends, and about every day when he’s on vacation. It’s a game that, once you get addicted to it, you try to play during every non-workday or moment of downtime you get, especially when you start showing signs of improvement.”
Obama is such an avid player that once he actually crashed a wedding because of it!
While visiting California last year, the President enjoyed a round of golf at Torrey Pines Golf Course in La Jolla, where Stephanie and Brian Tobe were about to tie the knot.
The couple saw secret service SUV’s pulling up during the wedding and were told to delay the ceremony while the President finishes the 18th hole. The couple took several pictures with the president and said that he was gracious and made their day very special by his unexpected appearance.
Rafting:
Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, can navigate through rough waters just as easily as through diplomatic entanglements.
Last year the minister and his partners managed to complete the 600-meter stretch of rapids in the Novgorod region.
The foreign minister is known as a rafting fan and has done a lot for the development of the extreme sport in Russia. Thanks to his efforts, Russia now has its own Rafting Federation, which he headed in 2007-2009.
Lavrov has been involved in watersports since 1985 and often compares brainstorming in diplomacy with the daunting task of paddling through whitewater rapids.
Fishing:
“Good things come to those who bait.” The famous quote describing fishing must be why Russia’s President Vladimir Putin loves it so much.
“Fishing is my kind of sport: I love it and I'm always happy to use any opportunity to sit down with a fishing rod.”
“Unfortunately, such occasions are very rare. However, sometimes my work actually helps me in this. How else could I go fishing in America, in the company of two presidents? Seriously, the best fishing in the world, according to my personal rating, is in the Murmansk Region and in the delta of the Volga River near Astrakhan,” the official Kremlin site reported Putin as saying.
Putin also recommended other fishing enthusiasts to visit the river Khemchik in the Republic of Tuva for an unforgettable holiday and fishing.
