Turkey’s First Esports Player Health Project Comes to Life with The Cooperation of TESFED and Zula

Under the leadership of Turkish Esports Federation (TESFED), a first-time project is starting with the idea of the training of conscious esports players in Turkey, under the tag of “Her Oyunun Başı Sağlık” (Health Comes First in Gaming). Zula Game will be carrying out the sports and nutrition education project. Also, the owner of Turkey’s only official domestic esports league, Zula Game will guide all players and young people who want to be esports players to get into the habit of doing healthy sports. The project that will continue to develop every year, aims to reach thousands of professional esports players.

Led by Turkish Esports Federation (TESFED), an exemplary project is being launched by Ingame Group.

The project “Health Comes First in Gaming” is the first step in this field in Turkey and also around the world. The hashtag created for the project is #heroyununbaşısağlık. As a part of the project, webinars will be organized for esports players and team owners. Videos with information about healthy eating and sports exercises will be prepared for esports players’ health. This content will be on TESFED’s Youtube channel.

The project aims to ensure the training of mindful esport players for the healthy development of esports and to reach thousands of players by continuing with improvements over the years.

The federation has licensed 2,121 esports players in 2 years.

TESFED, which has signed many important works since its establishment to spread esports to the base in Turkey. TESFED is taking steps to make Turkey one of the countries that have a saying in international esports. Active in the establishment of the European Esports Federation and elected as a founding member, TESFED continues its work towards professionalization in esports and pays special attention to licensing efforts. This is an important issue for Turkish players to represent Turkey in the international arena. The federation has licensed a total of 2,121 esports, 175 of which are women, in 2 years. During this time, the number of licensed clubs increased to 111, and also, the number of esports arenas, which were 3 in 2019, increased to 17.

President of TESFED Alper Afşin Özdemir: “Our country has great potential in esports”

TESFED Founding President Alper Afşin Özdemir said that given the young population of Esports in Turkey, is an area with great potential.

Alper Afşin Özdemir, who stressed that Esport is a sport branch that is about to enter the Olympics in any minute, said: “We can define esport as the sport of the future, with the rapid growth it experienced, we will witness that it will leave the most popular sport Football behind in a short time. As a federation, we give great importance to the establishment of this sport in our country with all its institutions and rules. The health issues of esports players are also one of the main cornerstones at this point.

Esports is a sport that requires hard work and constant training. Professional players maintain a strict and continuous working pace, such as routine daily training for an average of 4-5 hours, as well as physical exercise with a coach. We believe that by educating conscious esports players with this project, there will be a significant contribution to the healthy development of esports in our country ” he said.

The institution that makes the most investment in esports and esport players in Turkey…

Established with the motto of being a player company rather than a game company, Ingame Group has given special importance to esports since its beginning with the responsibility of being a domestic company.

InGame Group opened Turkey’s first and largest eSports Center “Nonstop Zula eSports Center” in Europe, in 2019. They train professional esports players in Zula Super League. They also launched the “Zula women’s League”, the first women’s League in Turkey this year, to strengthen the presence of women in esports. InGame Group invested 10 million TL in esports in 2019.

InGame Group Co-Founder and CEO Genco Alp:

“We have trained 10 thousand esports players so far, we have licensed those who started professional life”

InGame Group Co-Founder and CEO, Genco Alp stated that esports is a very young sports branch. Especially, the name of which has started to be heard frequently in recent times, but in the next 10 years, it will become one of the most important sectors.

Genco Alp, who stated that they acted with the responsibility of being 100 percent domestic games and realized many firsts in Esports with the Zula brand, continued his words as follows:

There is an esports issue mentioned frequently, especially for the last 3 years while there has been a huge growth in this new sport. Young people love esports very much in our country and now include it in their career plans.

As a domestic company, we always strive to take our best steps for the healthy and conscious development of esports. Also, we care about esports and esports players.

Turkey’s only domestic esports league, the Zula Super League, and its lower league, the Zula competition League, have trained around 10 thousand esports and licensed all of them to professional life. In the close future, we want to increase this figure by 20 thousand to extend to the base. We are proud to apply this important project together with our federation, with which we have always stood in solidarity. We will continue to develop this project. It is a crucial first step for the healthy development of esports in our country, in the coming years.”

“Health Comes First in Gaming”

The Zula Team penned a manifesto for the project with the caption #heroyununbaşısağlık. The manifesto included the following views:

“As the Zula Team, we have always focused on the players, listened to them and responded to what they expected. We acted with the responsibility of being a 100% domestic game. Including the Women’s League, we have conducted, founded, and organized many firsts in Turkey.

We have supported Esports and Esports players with all our opportunities. We have always been with them, we have inspired tens of thousands of young people in our country. Zula and TESFED have joined forces and we are starting to give sports and nutrition advice to our esports by using professionals who are experts in their fields.”

Experts will give sports and nutrition advice to esports players

The project aims to maintain physical balance and encourage the development of healthy living habits. Exercise and healthy living support program videos will be shot under the name “Health Comes First in Gaming”.

In the first series of training videos; life coach Adil Ayvaz will inform the Zula esports players about the most appropriate exercise programs to maintain their physical health.

9-Week Training Program

Exercise & healthy living support program includes; back, waist and neck exercises, spine alignment exercises, exercises that increase muscular endurance, yoga, body awareness, proper food selection, diets without carbohydrates, sleep patterns, coping with stress, focus, strong immunity. The program will be a 9-week training program.

In these training videos; diet lists of the foods that professional players should consume and avoid and physical activity recommendations will also be given.

It will be available for all esports players at any time on TESFED’s Youtube channel.

Future of the Sports…

Ranked as the 18th in the world, Turkey has about 32 million people who are interested in games and esports. While the size of the esports market in the world reaches $ 1 billion, it is estimated that the esports economy will approach $ 5 billion in the next 3 years. Turkey is the leader of the MENA region with a revenue of $ 908.8 million. Also, Turkey is an internationally ambitious country with an esports audience of 4.5 million.

In 2019, 21 esports events were held in 22 different games in our country. Since 2016, Turkey has had many successes in different types of games, especially the world championship.

30 million people plays Zula in Turkey and around the world

Zula is played by 30 million esports fans in more than 100 countries and 11 languages today. All designed by Turkish engineers and designers and maps often reflect the geographical culture. This makes players feel closer to the game.

Turkish holidays like April 29 October, April 23, May 19 are celebrated in the game. Also, there was Ramadan, Sahur – Iftar reminders. There are also historical attraction locations such as Üsküdar, Trabzon Uzungöl, Safranbolu, Çanakkale placed on the maps.

Zula, which has shown great success in esports, is gaining more and more viewers from around the world. It has also become a phenomenon on social media with millions of followers. Their 5.000 videos are also watched by more than 20 million per month in the world.