Fritz Schmidt (hockey player)

Fritz "Schimmi" Schmidt (born March 19, 1943 in Mainz ) is a former German hockey player and Olympic champion.

Fritz Schmidt played for RK Rüsselsheim . The midfielder was German champion in field hockey in 1968, 1971, 1975, 1977 and 1978, and in 1973, 1976 and 1979 he won the indoor hockey title. He was there as a player-coach in all of these Rüsselsheim championship successes, because he had been a player-coach in Rüsselsheim since 1966. After the end of his playing career, he worked as a coach from 1983 to 1985.

In 1963 he made his debut in the German national hockey team . At the 1968 Olympic Games , he was fourth with the team. In 1970 he won the title at the first European championship. At the first field hockey world championship , which took place in Pakistan in 1971, Schmidt took fifth place with the German championship. At the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich , Schmidt was only used in one preliminary round game because of a broken hand, but was also awarded Olympic gold.

After the Olympic Games, Schmidt became a regular player again and, as the successor to Carsten Keller, also became the captain. In those years the German hockey team was quite successful. The bronze medal at the 1973 World Championships was followed by the European Indoor Championship in 1974 and the 1974 Vice European Championship in field hockey. At the 1975 World Cup , the German team won bronze again. In 1976 the team won again at the European Indoor Championships. The 1976 Olympic Games were rather disappointing , with the German team only finishing fifth. In February 1977, after 146 international matches, he left the German national team with Dieter Freise , Michael Krause and Wolfgang Rott .

In 1971 Fritz Schmidt was awarded the Silver Laurel Leaf , the highest sporting award in Germany, and in 1979 the Paul Reinberg plaque from the German Hockey Association .

The trained master baker and confectioner ran his own business with a bakery in Rüsselsheim for decades, and several branches were added over the years. He gave up the bakery and branches in 2003 and went into an active retirement, in which the restoration of old cars, especially golf (low single-digit handicap), took up a large part of his time.

literature

• National Olympic Committee for Germany: The Olympic team of the Federal Republic of Germany. Montreal 1976 . Frankfurt am Main 1976

Web links

• About members of the Rüsselsheim Rowing Club - including Fritz Schmidt