Congratulations to the jubilarians

Yu. P. Vlasov at 50

English summary of Tyazhelaya Atletika. Ezhegodnik 1985 (Moscow: Fizkultura i Sport, 1985), p. 60: the text is paraphrased, not translated; figures are the original images.

Nearly twenty years have passed since Yury Vlasov left the platform, yet if today's strongest lifters gathered with Vlasov among the spectators, we would again feel the pull of his personality and undimmed fame.

In the mid-1950s the lifting world was spellbound by the records of Paul Anderson, the "Human Crane", who left an official world total of 518 kg and an unofficial 533 kg. For five years nobody touched them, and many believed that only a man of huge bodyweight could. Vlasov, called an elegant, even gentle giant, demolished that belief: it was intelligent strength that mastered the "fantastic" records. At the 1958 national championships he totalled 470 kg, far from world level; two years later he reached 537.5 kg at the Rome Olympics.

Flag-bearer of the Soviet team, he was Olympic champion in Rome and silver medallist at the next Games, world champion four times (1959, 1961, 1962, 1963) and European champion six times (1959–1964). He set 31 world records as a heavyweight and won five USSR titles (1959–1963) with 41 national records. He was the first to jerk over 200 kg (202.5, then 210 kg), the first past 170 kg in the snatch and 190 kg in the press, and the first to total 525, 550 and 580 kg. He holds the Order of Lenin and the Badge of Honour.

Records do not exhaust the man, in whom physical strength was intertwined with a thirst for creation. Vlasov could not live without struggle with himself, so the athlete lives on in Vlasov the writer, whose clever, passionate books tell of his life in sport, his victories and defeats. He has not really left the platform, and his best book may yet be ahead.