Nikolai Below (wrestler)

Nikolai Below medal table
Wrestler
Soviet Union
Olympic games
bronze	1952 Helsinki	medium
European Championship
gold	1947 Prague	medium

Nikolai Grigoryevich Below (born November 23, 1919 in Fyodorovskoye, † October 14, 1987 ) was a Soviet wrestler . He was European champion in 1947 and won a bronze medal in the Greco-Roman style in the middleweight division at the 1952 Olympic Games in Helsinki .

Career

Nikolai Below belonged to the Dynamo Moscow sports club . How and when he started wrestling is not known. He achieved his first successes as a wrestler in 1945 when he finished 3rd in the Soviet championship in the Greco-Roman style in middleweight division. Nikolai Below wrestled mainly in the Greco-Roman style, but also in the free style in the early years of his career.

From 1948 to 1951, he was four times in a row Soviet master in the Greco-Roman style and won a total of five other medals (three silver and two bronze medals) at these championships. His main opponents at these championships were Dawit Tschimakuridze , Grigori Tkachenko and Giwi Kartosia

He was only able to take part in international championships twice. That was because the Soviet Union did not belong to the world wrestling association FILA until 1952. In 1947, a Soviet wrestling team appeared at the European Championship in Greco-Roman style in Prague. The FILA let the wrestlers of this team start with a special permit at this European championship. Nikolai Below took advantage of this opportunity and became European middleweight champion in Prague with victories over Josef Bilý, Czechoslovakia, Gyula Németi , Hungary, Mohammed Moussa, Egypt, Axel Grönberg , Sweden and Muhlis Tayfur , Turkey.

After the Soviet Union joined the FILA, it was able to send a team to the Olympic Games in Helsinki. Nikolai Below was a member of this team. In Helsinki he won the Greco-Roman style middleweight division against Jerzy Gryt from Poland and Emile Courtois, Belgium, had a bye in the 3rd round and lost his last fights against Axel Grönberg and Kalervo Rauhala from Finland. He won a bronze medal with it.

He was not at the start at other international championships. In 1953 he was replaced as a top athlete in his weight class in the Soviet Union by Giwi Kartosia.

1955 defeated Nikolai Below in Moscow in an international match between the USSR and Sweden in the middleweight division Rune Jansson on points.

After the end of his active career, Nikolai Below worked as a wrestler trainer in Moscow.

International success

year	space	competition	style	Weight class	Results
1947	1.	EM in Prague	GR	medium	after victories over Josef Bilý, Czechoslovakia, Gyula Németi, Hungary, Mohammed Moussa, Egypt, Axel Grönberg , Sweden and Muhlis Tayfur, Turkey
1952	bronze	OS in Helsinki	GR	medium	after victories over Jerzy Gryt, Poland and Emile Courtois, Belgium and defeats against Axel Grönberg and Kalervo Rauhala, Finland

Successes in Soviet championships

year	space	style	Weight class	Results
1945	3.	GR	medium	behind Anton Aboljitsch and Wladimir Krutschkowski
1946	2.	GR	medium	behind Grigory Tkachenko, in front of Vladimir Kruchkovsky
1947	3.	F.	medium	behind Dawit Tschimakuridze and L. Chantimurgan
1948	1.	GR	medium	before Dawit Tschimakuridze and Grigory Tkachenko
1948	2.	F.	Semi-difficult	behind Vladimir Matschkapjan, in front of L. Markov
1949	1.	GR	medium	before Vladimir Krutschkowski and Grigory Tkachenko
1950	1.	GR	medium	before Grigory Tkachenko and Giwi Kartosija
1951	1.	GR	medium	before Grigory Tkachenko and Giwi Kartosija
1953	2.	GR	medium	behind Giwi Kartosija and in front of Leonid Anfinogow

Explanations

• GR = Greco-Roman style, F = freestyle
• OS = Olympic Games, EM = European Championship
• Middle weight, back then up to 79 kg, light heavy weight, up to 87 kg body weight

literature

• Athletics magazine
• Documentation of FILA International Wrestling Championships 1896 to 1976, publisher: FILA, 1976

Web links

• Nikolai Below in the database of Sports-Reference (English; archived from the original )