Hans Geupel

Hans Geupel (born October 10, 1923 in Meiningen ; † December 29, 2000 in Apolda ) was a German athlete and sports educator .

Live and act

The "master maker" next to his protégé Wolfgang Hoppe, bobsleigh world champion, around 1995

Geupel was the son of the sports teacher Alwin Geupel and his wife Grete geb. Penning. Despite suffering from a joint disease at the age of five, he was already enthusiastic about sport as a child. When his health stabilized, he began to play tennis and hockey . After his parents moved to Apolda, he joined the tennis and hockey club at the age of eleven and in 1936 became a member of the Apolda gymnastics club . In tennis, he won third and second place in singles . As an adolescent, he was three times in ice hockey and twice in hockey with his team Thuringia winner .

After graduating from high school , he volunteered for the Wehrmacht , but there soon lost his youthful enthusiasm. Because of insubordination, he was transferred to Munich , where he was taken prisoner by the US in 1945 . After his return to Apolda he learned the trade of knitter . In his free time he was drawn to sports again. After completing a course in 1951 he became a physical education teacher at a school in the city. From 1956 to 1962 he exercised the function of the district gymnastics council - occasionally appointed head teacher - then until 1975 he worked again as a sports teacher at another school. From 1975 to 1986 he was employed as a district sports teacher at the DTSB .

His strengths lay in the fact that he was able to encourage young people with disabilities to develop willpower and motivation among the many practicing and sporting people. Under his guidance and support, numerous GDR champions , European and world champions and Olympic champions emerged from Apolda . B. the bobsleigh world champion Wolfgang Hoppe . Funded he also Matthias Trübner, Gerd Elze, Sigrun Siegl and Christine Laser in 1976 in Montreal the double success at the Olympic Games in the pentathlon completed. World and European champions learned to run, throw and jump from the strict trainer Hans Geupel, according to Uwe Langhammer (staff) and Marco Liebeskind (high).

That is why he was nicknamed “the master maker”.

Hans Geupel was a member of the Liberal Democratic Party of Germany (LDPD) and, with her mandate, she was the city ​​councilor of Apolda for many years . In the mid-1970s he became the organizer of the establishment of the club house for tennis athletes. In 1992, together with like-minded people, he re-founded the “Turnverein Apolda eV 1856”, of which he became president and later honorary president.

Honors

• Honored Master of Sports
• After his death in June 2001 the city of Apolda named its new sports facility " Hans-Geupel-Stadion "

After the partial renovation of the Hans Geupel Stadium [2012], a memorial plaque was installed in honor of Hans Geupel.

Web links

• Master of Sports Hans Geupel