Einar Karlsson (wrestler)

Erik David Einar Karlsson (born September 1, 1908 in Stockholm ; † February 17, 1980 ibid) was a Swedish wrestler and two-time medalist at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 1932 and in Berlin in 1936 .

Career

Einar Karlsson began as a teenager in "Djurgardens" Stockholm with the rings . He was trained in many ways and developed into an excellent wrestler in both styles (free and Greco-Roman style). As early as 1929 he was appointed to the Swedish national wrestling team and was given his final touch here by the Finnish national coach of the Swedish wrestlers Robert Oksa. Einar usually weighed around 65 kg and started out as a lightweight, but also had no problems training down to featherweight (up to 61 kg body weight), which he often did. In 1931 he won his first title at a Swedish championship in the Greco-Roman style in the lightweight. His international career had already started a year earlier at the European Championships in Stockholm. There he defeated the German master Johannes Ohl from Groß-Zimmer , but has not yet won a medal. Even at the European Championships in Prague in 1931 , where he was used again in the lightweight in the Greco-Roman style, he did not succeed in this despite a remarkable victory over the Hungarian Károly Kárpáti .

He was finally able to achieve this first medal win at the 1932 Olympic Games in Los Angeles . Here he wrestled in free style in featherweight. After three wins he lost against the Finn Hermanni Pihlajamäki on points and won the bronze medal.

In 1933 Einar was again lightweight at the European Championships in Helsinki in the Greco-Roman style and won a silver medal with 2 wins and 2 losses, aided by a good draw and the injury of Eduard Sperling from Dortmund with 2nd place.

At the European Championships in 1934 in Rome , Einar again won a bronze medal in the Greco-Roman style in the lightweight and only achieved 6th place at the European Championships in Brussels in 1935 in the free style in the lightweight, although he had defeated the 1932 Olympic champion Hermanni Pihlajamäki.

In 1936 Einar won a bronze medal again at the Olympic Games in Berlin in the Greco-Roman style featherweight. After five wins with Aarne Reini, he was again a Finnish wrestler.

At the European Championship in 1937 in the Greco-Roman style in Paris , the last to be played by Einar, the three first-placed featherweight champions Einar Karlsson, Heinrich Schwarzkopf from Germany and Kustaa Pihlajamäki defeated each other. Einar achieved perhaps the greatest victory of his career with the victory over Kustaa Pihlajamäki. The defeat against Heinrich Schwarzkopf prevented his title win. Because Kustaa Pihlajamäki and Heinrich Schwarzkopf had a better point ratio from the preliminary fights, Einar was third.

Einar Karlsson struggled for a few more years at national level and in 1939 switched to IK “Sparta” Malmö .

The results of the international championships that he contested can be seen in the following section.

International success

(OS = Olympic Games, EM = European Championship, GR = Greco-Roman style, F = free style, Fe = featherweight, Le = lightweight, at that time up to 61 kg or 66 kg body weight)

• 1929, 1st place . Intern. Tournament in Stockholm , GR, Fe, before Svend Martinsen , Norway a . A., Hyrynkangas, Sweden ;
• 1930, 4th place , EM in Stockholm , GR, Fe, with a victory over Johannes Ohl , Germany and defeats against Svend Martinsen and Ödön Zombori , Hungary ;
• 1931, 6th place , EM in Prague , GR, Le, with a victory over Károly Kárpáti , Hungary and defeats against P. Parisel, France and František Kratochvil, Czechoslovakia ;
• 1932, bronze medal , OS in Los Angeles , F, Fe, with victories over Ioannis Farmakidis, Greece , Ichiro Hatta, Japan and Joseph Taylor, Great Britain and one defeat against Hermanni Pihlajamäki , Finland ;
• 1933, 2nd place , EM in Helsinki , GR, Fe, with victories over Arild Dahl, Norway and Silvino Tozzi, Italy and defeats against Voldemar Väli , Estonia and Aarne Reini , Finland;
• 1934, 3rd place , EM in Rome , GR, Le, with victories over Josef Herda , Czechoslovakia, Alberto Molfino, Italy and Walter Strand, Norway and defeats against Voldemar Väli and Abraham Kurland , Denmark ;
• 1935, 6th place , EM in Brussels , F, Le, with a victory over Hermanni Pihlajamäki and defeats against Jean Lalemand, Belgium and Wolfgang Ehrl , Germany;
• 1936, bronze medal , OS in Berlin , GR, Fe, with victories over Ernst Lehmann, Switzerland , Henryk Šlazak, Czechoslovakia, Gyula Mori, Hungary, Hideichi Yoshioka, Japan and Sebastian Hering , Germany and one defeat against Aarne Reini;
• 1937, 3rd place , EM in Paris , GR, Fe, with victories over Vádar Brdek, Czechoslovakia, Fecske, Hungary, Nikolaes Biros, Greece and Kustaa Pihlajamäki , Finland and a defeat against Heinrich Schwarzkopf , Germany

Swedish championships

Einar Karlsson was Swedish featherweight champion in 1932, 1937, 1939, 1940 and 1941 and Swedish lightweight champion in 1931, 1933 and 1934, each in Greco-Roman style.

swell

• Documentation of FILA's International Wrestling Championships, 1976
• various issues of the specialist magazine "Athletik" from 1929 to 1936 and the specialist magazine "Kraftsport" from 1937
• Statistics from the Swedish Wrestling Federation about the Swedish championships

Web links

• Einar Karlsson in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )