Iranians attached high value to athletic qualities and characters throughout their long history. in modern times Iranian athletes in the fields of wrestling and weight lining have won gold medals in .many international competitions including several Olympic games; while the Iranian national football team has become the champion of Asia in more than a few rounds of the Asian games.

Iranian men and women athletes have equal opportunities for exercise in hundreds of gymnasiums all over the country while academic and educational institutes also provide reasonable facilities for sports. Iranian women proved their athletic talent in the first round of Muslim women's championship in Tehran.

 

Zurkhaneh (Traditional Jim) is the place where Iranian athletes practice the country's traditional sport; a series of exercises that are accompanied by a certain style of music that is created with a big hand-held drum (Zarb) and one or more bells (Zang) hanging from the ceiling.

The athletes do their exercises in an arena about two meters lower than the place where Morshed chants epical poems from Ferdowsi's Shahnameh (The Book of Kings) and plays the two instruments he has at his disposal. Both the Morshed and the athletes express overt and dramatic respect for the elderly and veteran sportsmen who may happen to enter the place during the exercise.

In their exercises the athletes, wearing traditional costumes, depiet acts ofwar as they were practiced in pre-historic Persia. These include the use of bow, shield and heavy clubs in exaggerated forms.