Paul Anderson (weightlifter)
Paul Anderson ( born October 17, 1932 in Toccoa, Georgia; † August 15, 1994 ) was an American weightlifter.
Career
Paul Anderson, who suffered as a child with severe liver disease, weighed as a teenager at a height of 1.75 m already around 90 kg, and showed little athletic talent. He therefore decided to play football, to become fitter. He wanted to improve his physical performance through targeted weight training. He studied in the meantime at a university and concentrated now fully on the weight lifting. His body weight increased over time to about 150 kg. In 1953 he made the first time through a third place to gain recognition in the U.S. Junior Championships with 437.5 kg in the Olympic triathlon. In December 1953, it had reached 450 kg, than in January 1954, he broke a hand and in the fall of 1954, suffered a car accident, so he could deny no competitions throughout the year 1954.
In 1955 he was American champion for the first time. In the summer of 1955 he stayed with the U.S. national team, at the country battle - travel in the USSR, a trip that was organized by the U.S. State Department and should lead to a better understanding with the USSR. In the fall of 1955 he became world champion in the heavyweight division in Munich. In 1956, he scored at the U.S. championships with 533 kg his best ever achieved powerlifting performance. Then he tried to reduce his body weight in order to become more flexible in the snatch and jerk through a targeted diet. He took 168 kg up to 138 kg body weight. With the pounds melted away but his strength there, of which he actually lived. So he could only press 167.5 kg at the Olympic Games in Melbourne in 1956, almost 20 kg less than in Munich in 1955. Only a special performance in the third trial of poking at 187.5 kg after two failed attempts at this weight, about 1.5 kg heavier saved his Olympic victory against the Argentine Humberto Selvetti, who scored the same performance as Anderson with 500 kg, but had.
After the Olympic Games in 1956 Anderson resigned from competitive skating and worked as a power athlete, boxer and catcher. When enough money was gathered, he founded in 1961 with his wife, a youth center, in which he recorded stranded young people, trying to reduce them to a Christian life.
After a kidney transplant in 1983 Paul Anderson died in 1994 at age 62.
International success
- In Moscow: Anderson, 518 kg, against Alexei Medvedev Sidorovitch, 450 kg,
- In Leningrad: Anderson, 512.5, kg against Yevgeny Novikov, 450 kg.
USA Championships
World Records
In beidarmigen Press:
In beidarmigen tearing:
152.5 kg, 1956 in New York.
In beidarmigen Launched:
In Olympic triathlon:
- 497.5 kg, 1955, Hyde Point,
- 517.5 kg, 1955 York,
- 533 kg, 1956 New York.