Who is Ivan Poddubny and how much did he weigh? Ivan Poddubny: photo, biography and personal life of a famous athlete.

Even those who are not interested in the history of sports and strength martial arts have undoubtedly heard this name more than once - Ivan Poddubny. It thundered in the arenas not only of Russia, but also of Europe, and then of the American continent, throughout the first few decades of the twentieth century.

What is Poddubny famous for and why is he not forgotten today?

In the fall of 1871, in the village of Bogodukhovka, Poltava province, a son, Ivan, was born into the family of the hereditary Cossack Maxim Poddubny. Like many generations of his ancestors, he grew up unusually strong and strong. The family lived poorly, and Ivan had to start earning his bread at the age of 12. In 1893, fate brought him to Crimea, where he worked as a loader in the port.

The favorite entertainment of the poor at that time was the circus, where, in addition to the traditional acts of acrobats, trainers and clowns, there were performances by strongmen and Greco-Roman wrestling masters. The young loader decided to test himself in martial arts and in 1896, at the Feodosia circus, he won his first victories over a number of famous Russian athletes.

Since then, his career as a professional wrestler and weight lifter began. helped him defeat recognized champions. He won his victories in the arenas of Paris and Berlin, London and Budapest. Over a more than forty-year athletic career, he did not lose a single tournament, although he still remained a loser in several fights. In 1924, after the end of the Civil War, Poddubny, with the permission of the Soviet government, went on a tour of the United States for several years. There he earned fame strongest man planet, an invincible wrestler and the title of “Mr. America”.


Returning home, he continued to amaze the audience with his unprecedented physical strength. He placed a wooden telegraph pole on his shoulders and invited those from the public to cling to its ends. This continued until the pillar broke in two under the weight of people. In 1939, Poddubny was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, which was presented to him in the Kremlin by the head of the Government M. Kalinin himself.

The weight of an athlete, especially in power sports, has great value, since this indicator can be used to judge how developed his muscles are. Weighing athletes has been practiced since the beginning of the twentieth century. According to different years, Ivan Poddubny’s weight fluctuated around 120 kilograms. At the age of 32, when the Russian hero participated in the world wrestling championship in Paris, his weight was 118 kilograms. At the same time, other measurements were carried out that make it possible to judge physical parameters strongman:

- height - 184 centimeters;

— chest volume when exhaling – 134 centimeters;

- neck circumference - 50 centimeters;

- biceps volume - 46 centimeters;

- thigh volume - 70 centimeters.

Of course, no anabolic steroids or muscle growth stimulants were known at that time. Large quantity proteins were also not part of his menu: according to numerous testimonies Ivan Poddubny ate almost no meat; the main dishes in his diet were porridge, bread and vegetables.


The champion was very fond of boiled “in the skins” and drank a lot of milk - this was the usual diet of a wealthy peasant of those years.

One of the hero’s favorite jokes was his act with his cane, which looked like an ordinary wooden stick. But when he asked someone to hold it for a couple of minutes, the “lucky” one would immediately drop the cane, most often on his own foot.

It’s not surprising, because a pound (16 kg) of cast iron was hidden inside. Watching Poddubny from the side, no one could guess the true weight of the cane: in his hands it fluttered as if carved from light wood.

Success, of course, did not come to Ivan Poddubny by itself. When under the guidance the most experienced trainer At the time of Eugene De Paris, he began to study French wrestling, his daily routine was extremely strict. The morning began with exercises and strength exercises with dumbbells.

Every day, in addition to learning techniques, the strongman had three sparring sessions with professional athletes lasting 20 minutes and 30 minutes. and one hour, during which he had to give his full strength. The training was completed with a five-kilometer run, during which he always had two-kilogram dumbbells in his hands.

Once, when Poddubny was asked if there was a person stronger than him, he replied: “Yes, there is. This is my father." In his entire life, the famous “Champion of Champions” did not lose a single tournament. Of course, there were isolated defeats in battles.

The most famous of them was the loss to the French champion Le Boucher, who came to the mat after smearing himself olive oil, and therefore slipped out of the toughest grips. Subsequently, Poddubny took revenge, defeating not only Le Boucher, but also his partner Paul Pons, whom he pinned to the mat and held for about 20 minutes straight.

On October 8, 1871, the legendary wrestler and athlete Ivan Poddubny was born in the Poltava province. Ivan’s father, Maxim Ivanovich, was known throughout the area for his phenomenal strength and heroic stature, as were his ancestors, the Zaporozhye Cossacks. From the very early age the boy plowed the land, threshed rye and threw haystacks - the simplicity of the peasant way of life and hard physical labor laid in his character extraordinary perseverance and helped to accumulate powerful strength.

From 1893 to 1896, the young man worked as a port loader in Sevastopol and Feodosia, and later as a clerk at the Livas company. Poddubny gained fame when, by chance, he ended up in the Feodosia circus of Beskaravainy, where the most famous athletes of that time performed: Lurikh, Borodanov, Razumov and the Italian Pappy. For two days, the 25-year-old loader watched their fights in the arena, and on the third he could not stand it and asked permission to go out onto the mat. Ivan dealt with all the celebrities instantly - great george Lurich was defeated in two minutes.

Since 1897, Poddubny performed in circus arenas not only as a wrestler (he started with Russian belt wrestling, later switching to classical wrestling), but also as a weight lifter. Over the course of several years, Ivan visited about 50 cities in 14 countries. Anton Chekhov, Fyodor Chaliapin, Alexander Blok, Sergei Yesenin and many others spoke of the athlete with great respect. Maxim Gorky told him: “You are the personification of the strength of our people. You are a Russian hero. That's who you are! And you have to feel it and be proud of it.”

Chekhov, Chaliapin, Blok, Yesenin spoke of Poddubny with great respect

In the years Civil War the athlete was arrested by the Odessa Cheka and sentenced to death, but was soon released. From 1922 to 1924, Poddubny worked at the Moscow Circus, after which he went on tour in Germany and the USA. “He broke the world's best wrestlers without any regret and without the slightest embarrassment. It was as strong as a natural hurricane. Of all the laws of life, he knew one: “Man is a wolf to man” and firmly followed his command. In clean and jerks - no competition. If it happened that the opponent resisted especially desperately, Poddubny would definitely step on his foot on the ground. He was terrible not only for Russians, but also for all foreign wrestlers: if he doesn’t quit, he’ll break him,” his frequent rival Ivan Lebedev wrote about the wrestler.

On February 23, 1926, all the telegraphs on the planet trumpeted about the 55-year-old athlete: “The other day, Ivan Poddubny defeated the best wrestlers of the new world in New York, winning the title of “American Champion.” In November 1939, in the Kremlin, for his outstanding services “in the development of Soviet sports,” he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor and awarded the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR. Poddubny finally left the carpet in 1941, when he turned 70 years old.

After the war, he lived in terrible poverty - for the sake of food he had to sell all the awards he had won. On August 8, 1949, the great athlete died of a heart attack in Yeisk, a small resort town on the coast Sea of ​​Azov.

On the day of remembrance of the great strongman, the site publishes a selection of interesting facts from his biography.

1. From a young age, Ivan Poddubny set himself a strict sports regime: exercises with weights and barbells, dousing cold water, proper nutrition and complete abstinence from alcohol. In 1903, at the championship in Paris, the athlete was given medical card, which indicated the volumes of his neck (50 cm), belt (104 cm), biceps (46 cm), forearm (36 cm), thigh (70 cm), wrist (21 cm), calf (47 cm), lower leg (44 cm) and chest when exhaling (134 cm). With a height of 184 cm, he weighed 120 kg. Contemporaries of the Russian hero said that he constantly carried with him a steel cane weighing 16 kg. In 1910, the weight of gold medals and athlete badges was equal to two pounds.

Ivan Poddubny weighed more than 120 kg and was a vegetarian

Poster with the image of Ivan Poddubny

2. Ivan Poddubny grew his famous mustache in 1898 on the advice of Kyiv circus performer Akim Nikitin: “It’s no good, Ivan Maksimovich, for a Zaporozhye Cossack without a mustache. Now you are no longer a loader, but a fighter, an artist. And an artist of a famous circus. The position, my friend, obliges. By the way, come see our photographer - we will display your portrait in all stores on Khreshchatyk,” he said. Then it appeared famous photograph an athlete with a mustache, in a Circassian coat with gazyrs and a dagger. By the way, the Dnepropetrovsk Historical Museum houses a portrait of Poddubny by Nikolai Strunnikov, in which the athlete is depicted as Zaporozhye Cossack. The painting was painted in 1906, when the wrestler was visiting his friend, the historian of the Zaporozhye Cossacks Dmitry Yavornitsky, in Yekaterinoslav.

Ivan Poddubny, 1898

3. The end of the 20s of the 20th century was marked by a long black streak in the life of an athlete. In 1919, when Poddubny performed in the Zhytomyr circus, he was almost shot by drunken anarchists. Later, a drunken officer shot at him in Kerch, and a year later the athlete ended up in the dungeons of the Odessa Cheka. The final chord was his wife’s betrayal, because of which he stopped eating and talking for a long time. Poddubny came to his senses only after receiving a letter of repentance, but was never able to forgive his unfaithful wife.

Photo of Ivan Poddubny at one of the tournaments

Maxim Gorky considered Poddubny “the personification of the strength of our people”

4. In 1924, 53-year-old Ivan Poddubny lost a fight to Ryazan wrestler Ivan Chufistov (this was their second meeting, Poddubny won the first). After the fight, he said to his opponent: “Eh, Vanka, I lost not to you, but to my old age.”

Ivan Poddubny, 1924

5. During the Great Years Patriotic War Ivan Poddubny lived in German-occupied territory and continued to wear his Order of the Red Banner of Labor. The Germans even allowed him to open a billiard hall at a military hospital and offered to go to Germany to train German athletes. Poddubny answered briefly: “I am a Russian wrestler. I will remain that way.”

Ivan Poddubny: “I am a Russian wrestler. I will remain that way"

Monument to Ivan Poddubny in Yeysk

6. After the death of the athlete, an order came from Moscow to bury him with honors, but the Russian hero was laid behind the cemetery fence. Until the early 70s, Poddubny’s grave remained abandoned, until BBC radio reminded everyone about tragic fate legendary athlete. Today, the folk trail to the grave of the champion of champions is not overgrown.

The people are full of love for themselves,
Here the Russian hero lies;
Never been he is defeated,
Victories and the score are forgotten.
Years will pass... Without fading,
He will live in our hearts!
Without knowing your opponents,
Only death he could not defeat!

Mikhail Porechenkov as Ivan Poddubny in the film “Poddubny”, 2014

7. In 1957, the film “The Fighter and the Clown” was made about Ivan Poddubny with Stanislav Chekan in leading role, and in 1985 - “Know ours!” with Dmitry Zolotukhin. In 2005 it was shown on television documentary“Ivan Poddubny. The Tragedy of a Strong Man,” and in 2014, the biographical drama “Poddubny” was released on Russian screens with Mikhail Porechenkov, who specially gained weight for this role.

Hello, colleagues and friends! Of the people who are distinguished by their excellent strength, the name Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny is the most famous on the entire planet. This wrestler, athlete is known even to those who are not interested in circus wrestling, strongmen.

For 40 years in professional sports, he has not lost a single one. major battle. With enormous strength, original tactics, honesty, and originality, Ivan Poddubny, the first six-time world champion in Greco-Roman wrestling, glorified Russia in the first half of the 20th century. And even now the world has not forgotten the Russian hero.

More interesting articles about outstanding personalities bodybuilding:

Zaporozhye Cossack Ivan Poddubny

Four documentaries have been made about him and feature films. Many scientific, journalistic and artistic works have been written. He left disciples whose names are also known to the world (Zherebtsov, Karimov).

His biography covers the years of his life from 1871, when he was born in the Poltava province, to 1949, when he died of a heart attack in Yeisk. This man was called the King of Fighters, the Russian Hero, the Champion of Champions, Ivan Zhelezny. The respect for him was immeasurable.

A farm laborer from the age of 12, a longshoreman, a weight lifter and a circus wrestler, he traveled to 14 countries on four continents. Starting from Feodosia, where he performed with the Ivan Beskaravainy circus, then with the Enrico Truzzi circus, spectators in more than 50 cities were amazed at the natural strength that the strongman demonstrated in Russian belt wrestling, and then in classical French wrestling.

He defeated the invincible before him. And he recognized only his father as stronger than himself. From which he got a height of 184 centimeters, a weight of 118 kilograms at 32 years old and a biceps of 46 centimeters.

A rare film from 1912 has survived, which gives an idea of ​​the competitions of that time, a half-minute video of one of the tournaments on the street of a European city. Evidence of the time and history of Greco-Roman wrestling - photos on posters of the beginning of the century with the image of Poddubny.

Chronicles of the Russian hero

Poddubny fought his last victorious fight at the age of 70. Incredible but true. His whole life was devoted to fights for championship. His poor family all that could give him as an inheritance was remarkable strength, purity and naivety of soul. He was not known to fix fights, did not take bribes and never lied.

Ivan Poddubny was a professional wrestler, so he did not participate in amateur Olympic Games. At the world championship in Paris in 1903, our hero represented Russia. It was necessary to emerge victorious from a battle with 130 contenders. Having won 11, Poddubny almost left the sport forever, faced with the meanness of his opponent and the indifference of the judges.

Raoul le Bouche could not defeat the Russian Ivan in a fair fight and resorted to a trick: he covered himself with fat, making it almost impossible to grab him. The judges dismissed Poddubny's statement and awarded the victory to the Frenchman.

True, justice overtook him. The public went wild when the following year in St. Petersburg Poddubny humiliated Le Bouche by holding him on the carpet for 20 minutes in an uncomfortable and shameful position.

Since 1903, for six years in a row, Ivan Poddubny was the winner of the World French Wrestling Championship in Paris. In 1911 he became a Knight of the Legion of Honor (France).

In 1910, the wrestler made his first attempt to end his career. Returning to his homeland, he started a household and got married. However, his personal life did not work out. The wife of Antonin Kvitko-Fomenko turned out to be one of those women who would willingly make a millionaire out of a billionaire. And in Civil, she completely disappeared from his life.

All the years, Ivan could not forget his circus love - gymnast Masha Dozmarova. On the eve of their wedding, she fell from under the circus big top and fell to her death. And only in 1922 his marriage to Maria Semenovna Mashonina brought him happiness. They lived together for 27 years before his death. He raised her son Ivan, who died in the first battles of World War II.

Poddubny did not have his own children, but he had godchildren. He willingly tinkered with them. They left memories of him, which historians are collecting bit by bit. Despite long life in sports, there is practically no documentary material left about Poddubny.

Left without funds thanks to his first wife, Ivan was forced to return to the circus on the eve of the First World War. Throughout the Civil War he traveled across the expanses of Russia. In 1922 he received an invitation to the Moscow Circus. And already from him in 1924 he was sent on tour in Germany and the USA.

In America, he had to relearn because the rules of discipline and competition were different from European ones. And the age of 52 caused a stir among the organizers and the public. Americans could participate in tournaments from the age of 38, but not from 52! However, he had no equal.

Poddubny despised Americans and called them bandits. American sports have been incredibly criminalized. Unable to bear it, the wrestler got ready to go home. Even half a million dollars in the account did not stop him. To close the account, it was necessary to take American citizenship. Poddubny flatly refused.

Ivan returned as a hero. Made a second attempt to end his career. In 1939, at the age of 68, the athlete was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, which he proudly wore, without removing it even in critical situations of the occupation. In the same year he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR.

Settled in Yeisk. Fishing and the joys of retirement did not occupy Poddubny for long. He yearned for the fight. He organized a club of local strongmen in Yeisk and went to tournaments with them. He also performed. And even at his age he won victories. He didn't know how to lose at all. The coach was said to be very tough, even ruthless. Just as he did not spare his opponents in tournaments. He could throw him on the floor so hard his teeth would fly out.

Separately, it is necessary to say about some secret force that protected him in the most difficult moments. The Reds intended to shoot him in Grazhdanskaya, the Makhnovists did not touch him, the Nazis did not touch him when he proudly walked around occupied Yeisk with a Soviet order on his chest. On the contrary, they even gave him a job so that he could feed his family.

Then she returned Soviet power I was almost shot for working for the Nazis. However, his guardian angel sat on his right shoulder. He remained out of politics - Beria refused to train Dynamo, and the Nazis refused to train German athletes.

In 1945 he became an Honored Master of Sports of the USSR. But the pension remained meager; it was impossible to feed on it. And such a large body needed to eat intensively, especially since Ivan Maksimovich trained to the last every day.

Unfortunately, it’s so arranged that along with fame, people’s attention to their former idols goes away. A few friends and neighbors tried to help Poddubny’s family with all their might. How he once helped them.

On August 8, 1949, Poddubny passed away - death from a heart attack. In the park named after him, where the athlete is buried, a memorial bust was installed on his grave in 2011. “To the Champion of Champions in honor of his 140th birthday from grateful followers,” it reads. However, the memory of such an extraordinary person cannot be hidden by the years.

In 1953, the USSR Sports Committee established Poddubny memorials. Since 1962, international tournaments in memory of Poddubny have brought together the best athletes in the world. And in 1972, the name of Poddubny was given to the icebreaker ship of the Feodosia seaport.

The phenomenon of Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny is known all over the world. This is a man who possessed enormous physical strength. Ivan Poddubny is an athlete, professional wrestler, and circus performer. Thanks to his amazing abilities, he became a legend. His performances attracted and delighted a huge number of spectators not only in Russia, but also in different countries peace.

The biography of Ivan Poddubny is full of bright and interesting events.

Family

He was born on October 8, 1871 in the village of Bogodukhovka (now the village of Krasenovka) in the Poltava region into a family of farmers. Ivan was the first-born. Following him, six more children were born: three boys and three girls. The family lived poorly. WITH early childhood children were taught to work hard. At the age of twelve, the boy became a farm laborer, first for a landowner in his village, and then in a neighboring one. For 10 years he worked for local rich people. He was not drafted into the army because he was the eldest son in the family.

From his father, Ivan Poddubny inherited good health, a heroic physique, enormous strength and endurance. From his mother - an ear for music, thanks to which he was accepted to perform in the church choir on Sundays.

Start of a new life

At the age of 22 he moved to Crimea. He committed this act for the sake of the girl he loved. She reciprocated his feelings, but she was from a wealthy family, so her parents were against their daughter’s marriage to a poor man. Ivan went to Crimea in order to earn a lot of money and then return to her. However, after leaving native land, he very soon forgot about her.

For three years, Ivan Poddubny worked as a loader, first in the Sevastopol port, and then in Feodosia. Meeting athletes Anton Preobrazhensky and Vasily Vasiliev changed his life. Thanks to these people, he began to seriously engage in sports.

His weightlifting career began in 1887, when Beskorovainy’s circus came to Feodosia. Famous wrestlers Pyotr Yankovsky and Georg Lurich worked as part of the circus troupe. Anyone could compete with them. The circus announced a belt wrestling championship. Poddubny decided to take part in it. Over the next two weeks, he defeated almost all the circus athletes. Only one wrestler remained undefeated by him - the giant Peter Yankovsky.

Work in the circus

After this event, Ivan began regular training. The work no longer satisfied him, and he moved to Sevastopol. Here he works in a troupe of wrestlers, led by Georg Lurich, in the circus of the Italian Truzzi. He studied all the features of belt wrestling and developed a training system for himself. From an ordinary rude peasant he turned into a real professional athlete.

After some time, Ivan Poddubny was invited to work at the Nikitin brothers’ circus in Kyiv. He started touring with him. During 3 years of work in this circus, he visited all cities of the European part of Russia. His performances as a wrestler and athlete amazed the public. Ivan became a celebrity.

"Champion of Champions"

In 1903, the chairman of the St. Petersburg Athletic Society invited him to participate in the World French Wrestling Championship. Ivan began intensive preparation for this championship under the guidance of a French coach, which lasted three months.

There were 130 participants in the championship. Poddubny won 11 fights, but he lost to the Frenchman Boucher. The whole cunning of the insidious enemy was that his body was lubricated with olive oil, thanks to which he slipped out of the bear grip of the Russian hero. After this defeat, the Russian athlete became an opponent of dishonest methods in the ring.

A year later, Ivan Poddubny again met in the ring with Boucher. The fight lasted 40 minutes, as a result the Russian athlete won.

In 1905, Ivan again participated in the international championship in Paris. There he becomes world champion. After this victory, he was involved in competitions in different countries of the world and invariably defeated all his opponents.

For 40 years, the athlete did not lose a single championship, for which he was called the “champion of champions.”

Termination of an athlete's career

1910 was a turning point in sports career absolute champion. He unexpectedly decides to leave the sport and start a family. Antonina Kvitko-Fomenko became his wife. The hero spent all his savings on big house, two mills and an apiary in the Poltava region. However, Ivan did not turn out to be a landowner. He was illiterate and did not know how to run a household. In addition, his brother, who had become a drunkard, burned down his mill. As a result, Ivan soon went bankrupt.

At the age of 42, Poddubny returned to work in the circus. In Zhitomir, and later in Kerch, he performs in the arena. In 1922, he was invited to work first in the Moscow and later in the Petrograd Circus. Despite his advanced age and physical exertion, the wrestler is in good health. Due to severe financial situation Ivan Poddubny agrees to tour America and Germany. The artist's performances took place from great success. In 1927 he returned to his homeland.

Personal life of Ivan Poddubny

Ivan's first youthful love did not last too long. After leaving her native village, the girl was forgotten by him.

His second love is tightrope walker Emilia. She was older in age and skillfully played on his feelings. After she had a rich suitor, she ran away with him.

After failed relationships with Emilia Poddubny moved to Kyiv. There he met the gymnast Mashenka, who reciprocated the athlete’s feelings. She was fragile, small in stature, but distinguished by extraordinary courage. Masha performed under the circus big top, working on a trapeze without safety net. Together they made plans for their future life together. The wedding day was set. But one day, during the next performance, Mashenka fell from a height and was broken. After that tragic event Poddubny left the circus and became isolated. Only with the passage of time, having accepted the invitation to participate in the World Championships in Paris, was he able to return to his former life.

Ivan first married at the age of 40 to the beautiful Antonina Kvitko-Fomenko. They moved to the Poltava region and started a farm. Family life lasted for 7 years. But one day, when the athlete was on tour in Odessa, Antonina met an officer and ran away with him, taking her husband’s gold medals with her. After some time, she wanted to return to her former husband, but Ivan could not forgive her for her betrayal.

Last love

Maria Mashoshina became last love legendary athlete. She was a widow, the mother of his student. Ivan was charmed by her beauty, sensuality and friendliness. In 1927, returning from a tour of America, he married her. He lived with this woman until his last days. They bought a house in Yeysk on the shores of the Azov Sea. They had no children together, but Poddubny was very attached to Maria’s son and treated him with paternal warmth. The adopted son, Ivan Mashoshin, leaving professional wrestling, graduated technical university and began working as chief engineer of the Rostov automobile assembly plant. In May 1943, he died during a Nazi air raid. He left behind a son, Roman, whom Poddubny took care of as his own grandson.

Ivan got him used to sports, sent him to sports school, where the boy could practice classical wrestling. However, during the Great Patriotic War, the grandson went to the front and was seriously wounded. Therefore, in the future I had to give up my wrestling career.

At the end of life

In 1941, Ivan entered the ring in last time and traditionally won. He was 70 years old.

During the famine, it was especially difficult for the athlete, since his huge trained body required food in a much larger volume than rations. His health deteriorated.

In May 1947, Poddubny fell unsuccessfully, resulting in a hip fracture. He found himself tied to a bed and crutches. For an athlete accustomed to constant exhausting training, huge physical activity, bed rest became disastrous.

On August 8, 1949, Ivan Poddubny died of a heart attack. He was buried in Yeisk Park, not far from the graves of pilots who died during the war. In 1965, this park was named after I.M. Poddubny.

In 1955, a monument was erected at the grave of the great athlete. Not far from the grave is Memorial Museum where personal belongings are stored, unique photos Ivan Poddubny, posters and other exhibits telling about the life and sports career of this amazing person.

Famous athlete in cinema

When familiarizing yourself with the biography of Ivan Poddubny briefly, attention is drawn to the fact that, despite world fame, disasters, wanderings and instability in his personal life did not bypass him. The life story of the legendary strongman formed the basis of the Soviet film “The Fighter and the Clown.” It was created in 1957. Ivan Poddubny in the film is shown as a person possessing not only enormous physical, but also spiritual strength.

In 2014, cinema again turned to this topic. The film “Poddubny” repeated the previous film in many details.

The documentary film “The Tragedy of the Strongman” gained great popularity. Ivan Poddubny." It talks about interesting facts from the life of the legendary athlete.

A short biography of Ivan Poddubny is the story of a legendary man who became an unsurpassed example of sports longevity.

On August 8, 1949, in a quiet Kuban town, in a two-story house, Ivan Poddubny died. In official obituaries and books after his death they wrote: “A hip fracture sharply undermined the hero’s health. Bed rest turned out to be disastrous for a person who had been physically stressed all his life.”

Two residents of Yerevan who lived next door to the great athlete - Yuri Limansky and Nikolai Morev - have now turned seventy. There were half-truths in the obituaries, they said.

Place for settled life the Russian hero chose the poetic, over the cliff.

Ivan Poddubny lived in Yeisk for more than 20 years. Every snot-nosed kid was a fan. I was an activist in the museum then,” recalls Nikolai Morev, a veteran of the Great Patriotic War. In Yeisk they still keep his one-and-a-half meter wide robe and two-pound weights. In front of the boys, the strongman wrapped nails in a tube and offered to unwrap them.

There were rumors around Yeysk that Poddubny’s first wife ran away from him, taking with her all his sports medals. And in Yeisk, Poddubny settled with his second wife Maria Semyonovna. Poddubny did not have his own children - new wife he took with his stepson, whom he treated as to my own son. Taught him wrestling techniques.

In the fall of 1920, a French wrestling match took place in Rostov-on-Don. The public was intrigued by the “wrestler in a black mask” - that’s how the anonymous figure appeared on the poster. He was younger than Poddubny, but the fight was on equal terms. However, this brave man was eventually defeated. When the young wrestler’s mask fell from his face, the audience gasped: in front of Poddubny stood his adopted son. This story is kept in the Yeisk archives.

Before the Germans entered Yeysk, tenth-grader Nikolai Morev went to the front.

When I returned home after the war, I was surprised at the changes,” says Morev. - Poddubny has never been advertised like this anywhere before. Those who held high positions in the city tried to avoid him.

Another eyewitness, Yuri Limansky, who remained in the city during the occupation, tells about the reason for the disgrace:

When the Germans came to the city, there were two people in Yeisk who were awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor. One of them, a woman, was killed by the Fritz in a gas chamber. The second was Ivan Poddubny. The Nazis did not touch him. He opened a billiard room in the city. Here the men quietly listened to the Soviet radio and shared news about where ours had driven the Krauts out of.

But Poddubny was not forgiven for the billiard room later.

Nevertheless, after the war, the old athlete was given rations, and in 1945 he was given the title of Honored Master of Sports.

In 1947, he had a particularly hard time. Yeychan residents had difficulty recognizing the haggard old man on crutches as a former hero.

Once I went to my aunt, says Yuri Limansky, “he’s sitting there.” Her husband Zakhar Mitrich repaired his shoes and says:

Ivan Maksimovich, the guys are ready.

How much do I owe you?

Nothing.

“How grateful I am to you,” Poddubny said, syllable by syllable, with difficulty.

His relatives sat him down at the table. He was hungry.

“I could eat a kilogram of bread at a time,” he said, banging his spoon, “but these sons of bitches only give 500 grams.” Can't they really assign me to some military unit, to a canteen? I’ll probably write a letter to Voroshilov. But he never wrote it.

On August 8, 1949, I was at home,” says eyewitness Limansky. “My father came and said: “You don’t know anything?” Ivan Maksimovich died, get dressed.

And we went to bury him. He didn’t even have a suit; he had to buy one specifically for the funeral.

His foreign colleagues learned about the death of the Russian hero. When many arrived in Yeisk famous people“, the authorities had no choice but to get involved,” Nikolai Morev clarified.

They put up a simple fence and wrote in red lead: “Ivan Poddubny.” And everything is overgrown with grass. And then the BBC reported: “In the city of Yeisk, in desolation, the grave of Ivan Maksimovich Poddubny, whom no one in the world could lay down.” “Funds were immediately found,” Limansky continues the sad story.

Now in that place there is a monument to the invincible athlete, a museum and a sports school named after Ivan Poddubny have been created. World championships named after him are held every year. The homeland forgave the hero posthumously. Has he forgiven her?

Elena LUBINETS.