1988 Summer Olympics / Athletics - Shot Put (Men)

sport	athletics
discipline	Shot put
gender	Men
Attendees	21 athletes from 17 countries
Competition location	Seoul Olympic Stadium
Competition phase	September 23, 1988 (qualification and final)
Medalist Ulf Timmermann ( GDR )   Randy Barnes ( USA )   Werner Günthör ( SUI )

The men's shot put at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul was played in two rounds on September 23, 1988 at the Seoul Olympic Stadium. 21 athletes took part.

Olympic champion was Ulf Timmermann from the GDR. He won ahead of the American Randy Barnes and the Swiss Werner Günthör .

In addition to the Olympic champion Timmermann, Udo Beyer , Olympic champion from 1976 , also competed for the GDR . Beyer reached the final and finished fourth.
The Austrian Klaus Bodenmüller failed in the qualification.
Athletes from the Federal Republic of Germany and Liechtenstein did not take part.

Current title holders

Olympic champion 1984	Alessandro Andrei ( Italy )	21.26 m	Los Angeles 1984
World Champion 1987	Werner Günthör ( Switzerland )	22.23 m	Rome 1987
European champion 1986		22.22 m	Stuttgart 1986
Pan American champion 1987	Gert Weil ( Chile )	20.21 m	Indianapolis 1987
Central America and Caribbean Champion 1987	Marciso Boué ( Cuba )	18.15 m	Caracas 1987
South America Champion 1987	Gert Weil ( Chile )	19.35 m	São Paulo 1987
Asian champion 1987	Ma Yongfeng ( People's Republic of China )	18.32 m	Singapore 1987
African Champion 1988	Ahmed Mohamed Ashoush ( Egypt )	19.40 m	Annaba 1988

Existing records

World record	23.06 m	Ulf Timmermann ( GDR )	Chania , Crete ( Greece )	May 22, 1988
Olympic record	21.35 m	Vladimir Kisselev ( Soviet Union )	Final of Moscow , Soviet Union (today Russia )	July 30, 1980

qualification

Date: September 23, 1988

For the qualification, the athletes were drawn into two groups. The qualification distance for direct entry into the final was 20.20 m. Since only five athletes exceeded this distance (highlighted in light blue), the final field was filled with the next best athletes from both groups to twelve starters (highlighted in light green). So finally 19.71 m was enough for the final.

Group A

The American Randy Barnes, winner of the silver medal, in a picture from 1994

space	Surname	nation	1st attempt	Second attempt	3. Attempt	Expanse	annotation
1	Ulf Timmermann	GDR	21.27 m	-	-	21.27 m
2	Randy Barnes	United States	20.16 m	20.83 m	x	20.83 m
3	Alessandro Andrei	Italy	19.72 m	20.18 m	19.93 m	20.18 m
4th	Gert Weil	Chile	20.18 m	19.58 m	19.59 m	20.18 m
5	Jim Doehring	United States	16.89 m	17.66 m	19.73 m	19.73 m
6th	Georgi Todorov	Bulgaria	19.25 m	19.02 m	19.68 m	19.68 m
7th	Klaus Bodenmüller	Austria	18.89 m	17.54 m	-	18.89 m
8th	Ma Yongfeng	People's Republic of China	17.48 m	17.79 m	18.27 m	18.27 m
9	Ahmed Camel Shatta	Egypt	16.94 m	17.61 m	17.37 m	17.61 m
10	Paul Edwards	Great Britain	17.13 m	17.11 m	17.28 m	17.28 m
11	Han Min-soo	South Korea	15.67 m	15.68 m	15.64 m	15.68 m

Group B

The 1976 Olympic champion Udo Beyer, GDR, reached fourth place in the final

space	Surname	nation	1st attempt	Second attempt	3. Attempt	Expanse	annotation
1	Udo Beyer	GDR	x	20.97 m	-	20.97 m
2	Werner Günthör	Switzerland	20.70 m	-	-	20.70 m
3	Sergei Smirnov	Soviet Union	20.13 m	20.48 m	-	20.48 m
4th	Remigius Machura	Czechoslovakia	19.88 m	20.16 m	x	20.16 m
5	Georg Andersen	Norway	x	19.95 m	20.05 m	20.05 m
6th	Helmut Krieger	Poland	19.42 m	x	19.75 m	19.75 m
7th	Gregg Tafralis	United States	19.71 m	19.44 m	x	19.71 m
8th	Pétur Guðmundsson	Iceland	19.21 m	x	x	19.21 m
9	Ahmed Mohamed Ashoush	Egypt	18.19 m	18.94 m	18.50 m	18.94 m
10	Mohamed Al-Zinkawi	Kuwait	x	15.34 m	15.92 m	15.92 m

final

Olympic champion Ulf Timmermann from the GDR

Date: September 23, 1988

Twelve athletes had qualified for the final, five of them over the required qualification distance. All three US athletes were in the final and met two GDR athletes. There were also participants from Chile, Italy, Norway, Poland, Switzerland and Czechoslovakia.

World and European champion Werner Günthör from Switzerland met the world record holder Ulf Timmermann from the GDR and his compatriot Udo Beyer, who had already won the gold medal in 1976 . The US athlete Randy Barnes was also rated highly. The 1984 Olympic champion Alessandro Andrei from Italy had also qualified for the final, but no longer had the form to keep up with the front runners.

Timmermann took the lead in the first lap with 22.02 m, a new Olympic record . Günthör followed in second place with 21.45 m. In the second attempt, Günthör improved to 21.59 m and thus consolidated his second place. Beyer moved up to third with 21.40 m. In the third round there were further improvements: Timmermann hit 22.16 m - again an Olympic record - and Günthör came to 21.70 m. In the fifth attempt Günthör achieved his best distance with 21.99 m, while Timmermann improved again to 22.29 m and thus achieved the Olympic record in this final for the third time. He achieved a fourth record increase with his last attempt when Ulf Timmermann hit the ball 22.47 m. That was also the Olympic victory. With 22.39 m, Randy Barnes, who was previously in fourth place, improved by more than a meter to second and won the silver medal with his 22.39 m. For Werner Günthör with his distance from the fifth round there was bronze. Udo Beyer was pushed to the ungrateful fourth place by Barne's increase. The Czechoslovak Remigius Machura was fifth, the Chilean Gert Weil came in six, two centimeters ahead of the Olympic champion of the previous games Alessandro Andrei.

Two athletes exceeded the 22-meter mark in this high-class competition, two more pushed further than 21 meters and the Olympic contestant reached a distance of more than twenty meters.

Werner Günthör was Switzerland's first medalist in the shot put .

space	Surname	nation	1st attempt	Second attempt	3. Attempt	4th attempt	5th attempt	6th attempt	Bottom line	annotation
1	Ulf Timmermann	GDR	22.02 m OR	21.31 m	22.16 m OR	21.90 m	22.29 m OR	22.47 m OR	22.47 m	OR
2	Randy Barnes	United States	20.17 m	20.72 m	x	21.31 m	21.01 m	22.39 m	22.39 m
3	Werner Günthör	Switzerland	21.45 m	21.59 m	21.70 m	20.98 m	21.99 m	21.61 m	21.99 m
4th	Udo Beyer	GDR	x	21.40 m	20.84 m	20.82 m	21.30 m	21.31 m	21.40 m
5	Remigius Machura	Czechoslovakia	20.57 m	20.03 m	20.16 m	20.36 m	20.12 m	20.29 m	20.57 m
6th	Gert Weil	Chile	20.22 m	20.09 m	x	20.23 m	20.21 m	20.38 m	20.38 m
7th	Alessandro Andrei	Italy	19.71 m	20.17 m	20.06 m	19.93 m	20.36 m	20.26 m	20.36 m
8th	Sergei Smirnov	Soviet Union	20.11 m	x	20.36 m	x	x	x	20.36 m
9	Gregg Tafralis	United States	20.16 m	x	x	not in the final of the eight best athletes			20.16 m
10	Georg Andersen	Norway	x	x	19.91 m				19.91 m
11	Jim Doehring	United States	19.27 m	x	19.89 m				19.89 m
12	Helmut Krieger	Poland	x	19.51 m	x				19.51 m

Web links

• SportsReference Shot Put , accessed January 28, 2018
• Official report on the Olympic Games in Seoul Volume two, part two , results in athletics: p. 244, English / French (PDF, 25.64 MB), accessed on January 28, 2018

Video

• 1988 Olympic Games Men's Shot , published June 5, 2012 on youtube.com, accessed January 28, 2018

Individual evidence

1. ↑ IAAF Statistics Handbook, Beijing 2015, page 678 , accessed on January 28, 2018
2. ↑ ^{a b} Official report on the Olympic Games in Seoul Volume two, part two , Athletics results: p. 244, English / French (PDF, 25.64 MB), accessed on January 28, 2018