Posts about weightlifting history
One of my favorite weightlifters to watch was Stefan Botev. Botev was born on Feb.14, 1968, in Harmanli, Bulgaria, and was coached by the legendary Ivan Abadzhiev. Stefan stood 5′ 11 (180 centimeters) and competed in the 110 kilo/242 lbs weight class. Later in his career, he moved up to the Superheavyweight class but was … Read more
Before you get started with this article, you may want to read the first part, My Olympic Weightlifting Career. This is a continuation of my lifting career. For the next 22 years, I continued weightlifting. I could never match the heavy weights I had lifted in the past, and I had to make a lot … Read more
The first time I witnessed Weightlifting was on the television show “Wide World of Sports.” This show aired on ABC from 1961 to 1998. I can’t recall the exact year, but it was sometime during the early 1970s that I watched Vasily Alexeyev break another world record in the clean & jerk. Alexeev was a … Read more
When I first started Olympic Weightlifting in 1981, at nineteen years old, Tim was one of the first to help me. Tim had about three years of competitive weightlifting experience and was roughly three and a half years older than me. To say he was tough on me would be an understatement. Since I had … Read more
As with many weightlifters, Mark’s interest in the sport began with watching weightlifting on the Wide World of Sports on ABC television. Mark remembers watching Vasily Alekseyev become the first man to clean & jerk 500 lbs in 1970. This piqued Mark’s interest, and he began reading some Strength & Health magazines his older brother … Read more