Jack Günthard

Jacob "Jack" Günthard ( born January 8, 1920 in Hirzel ) is a former Swiss gymnast. He was Olympic champion in 1952.

Career

At the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki for the first time participated in the Turner from the Soviet Union dominated and equal in most decisions. Its main competitor was not the Finnish defending champion but the Swiss to Josef Stalder and Hans Eugster. The Swiss team finished second in the team standings to second place behind the gymnasts from the USSR but before the Finns. Jack Günthard reached in the individual standings rank 17th on high bar he won with 19.55 points ahead of Josef Stalder, and the German Alfred Schwarzmann, who received the same level of silver. 1957 Günthard European champion on the horizontal bar and parallel bars. 1951 and 1955 he won the Swiss Federal Gymnastics Festival.

Günthard had originally learned typesetter, but then went to a night school after high school and studied at the ETH Zurich sport. Later Günthard became a coach and was responsible, among other things, the Italian Turner to Franco Menichelli in their preparation for the Olympic Games in Rome in 1960 and 1964 in Tokyo. From 1965 Günthard was full-time at the Sports School in Magglingen and coached the Swiss Turner until 1980.