Josef Holeček (canoeist)

Josef Holeček (born January 25, 1921 in Říčany ; † February 20, 2005 in Prague ) was a Czechoslovak canoeist and Olympic champion.

At the 1948 Olympic Games in London , athletes from Czechoslovakia won three gold medals and one silver medal in the four Canadier competitions. Josef Holeček was the dominant athlete in the single Canadians over 1000 meters, he won his gold medal with eleven seconds ahead of the Canadian athlete Douglas Bennett , who in turn had two seconds ahead of the Frenchman Robert Boutigny .

Two years later, Holeček won the 1000 meter title at the first post-war World Cup, ahead of Robert Boutigny and the Swede Bengt Backlund . Boutigny won over 10,000 meters from Holeček and Backlund.

At the Olympic Games in Helsinki in 1952 , Czechoslovakia again provided the most successful team in the Canadians, each with a gold, silver and bronze medal. The only gold medal was won by Josef Holeček, who this time won by over seven seconds over the young Hungarian János Parti .

Josef Holeček was the only canoeist who was Olympic champion in single canoeing twice over the same distance, until Sebastian Brendel did the same in 2012 and 2016.

literature

• Volker Kluge : Summer Olympic Games. The Chronicle II. London 1948 - Tokyo 1964. Sportverlag Berlin, Berlin 1998, ISBN 3-328-00740-7 .

Web links

• Josef Holeček in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• World Championships 1000 meters
• World Championships 10,000 meters