Gustav Weinkötz

Gustav Weinkötz (born December 17, 1912 in Mannheim , † March 28, 1986 in Grasellenbach ) was a German athlete who was successful as a high jumper in the 1930s . He went down in history as the first German two-meter jumper.

The 1.87 m tall and 79 kg heavy athlete started for ASV Cologne .

Career

Weinkötz won the German championships four times in a row (1935, 1936, 1937 and 1938). There are also two third places in 1933 and 1939.

In 1934 he could not place himself. Nevertheless, this year was the most successful of his career, as he succeeded in first setting the German record set by Werner Bornhöfft the previous year and then surpassing it twice. For this he was rewarded with the nomination for the European Athletics Championships in Turin in 1934 , where he presented himself in excellent form and came fourth with a jump of 1.94 m. The Finn Kalevi Kotkas won with 2.00 m in front of three other athletes who jumped all 1.97 m.

Two years later, in the 1936 Olympic year, he continued his streak of success. At the games in Berlin he again mastered 1.94 m, which brought him to sixth place together with three other athletes. World record holder Cornelius Johnson won with 2.03 m in front of four other two-meter jumpers. Gustav Weinkötz was thus the best German, as Günther Gehmert and Hans Martens finished the competition in ten (1.90 m) and 32 (1.70 m) places.

In 1937 he won the ISTAF in Berlin . In the same year he also joined the group of two-meter jumpers. The world record at that time was 2.07 m, held by Cornelius Johnson and Dave Albritton , but George Horine 's first two-meter jump in the world was already 25 years ago. It was not until 1944 that Hermann Nacke was able to screw the German record by one centimeter to 2.01 m.

Records

• 1.94 m on June 17, 1934 in Luxembourg (setting of Werner Bornhöfft's record from 1933)
• 1.97 m on July 18, 1934 in Düsseldorf
• 1.98 m on July 22, 1934 in Frankfurt am Main
• 1.99 m on May 17, 1936 in Cologne
• 2.00 m on August 1, 1937 in Munich ( improved to 2.01 m by Hermann Nacke on August 20, 1944 in Kiel )

Web links

• Gustav Weinkötz in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )