Valentin Raychev

Valentin Rajtschew ( Bulgarian Валентин Райчев, English transcription Valentin Raychev, . Born August 20, 1958 in Sofia ) is a former Bulgarian wrestler. He was Olympic champion in 1980 in free style at welterweight.

Career

Valentin Rajtschew began as a teenager with the rings. After his talent was recognized, he was delegated to the Bulgarian giants Levski Spartak Sofia. There he matured into an excellent freestyle wrestler. He was in Bulgaria as a junior already very successful and represented his country at international championships since 1977. The greatest success he achieved this was the 2nd place at the Junior World Championships in Ulaanbaatar behind the Soviet athlete Yuri Worobiew.

1979 won Rajtschew the welterweight competition at the Balkan Games in Yambol before Necmi Gencalp from Turkey. This was his biggest success he had achieved before the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow. The starting place for these games, he secured by his success in the Bulgarian excretion Alexander Nanew. In Moscow Rajtschew showed excellent performance and defeated among others the top wrestler Pawel Pinigin from the USSR and Dan Karabin from Czechoslovakia, which he was Olympic champion. It should not be forgotten that the two best freestyle wrestler in the world that year, Leroy Kemp could not attend from the United States and Martin Knosp from the Federal Republic of Germany for the Olympic boycotts of their states at these games.

1981 occupied Rajtschew at the European Championships in Lodz 2nd place behind Elbrus Korajew from the USSR and also in the World Cup this year in Skopje, he was second winner. He lost the final against Martin Knosp clearly with 2:7 points.

After Rajtschew In 1981, although he was only 23 years old, with no other international championships more. The reasons for this are not known.

International success

(OS = Olympic Games, WM = World Championship, European Championship EM =, F = free style, We = welterweight, then to 74 kg body weight)