Takeshi Kato

Takeshi Katō at the 1966 World Gymnastics Championships

Takeshi Katō ( Japanese 加藤 武 司 , Katō Takeshi ; born September 25, 1942 in Aichi Prefecture ; † July 24, 1982 ) was a Japanese artistic gymnast . From 1966 to 1970 he won an Olympic gold medal and two world titles with the Japanese team.

Career

At the World Gymnastics Championships in Dortmund in 1966 , four team Olympic champions from 1964, Yukio Endo , Takashi Mitsukuri , Shūji Tsurumi and Haruhiro Yamashita , joined the Japanese ranks, along with Takeshi Katō and Akinori Nakayama . In the team standings, the Japanese won by more than four points, but in the individual standings, Mikhail Voronin from the Soviet Union won. In the device finals Katō won the bronze medal on the pommel horse behind the Yugoslav Miroslav Cerar and Michail Voronin. In the horse jump , all three medals went to Japanese gymnasts, Haruhiro Matsuda won ahead of Katō and Nakayama.

Two years later, Yukio Endo, Takeshi Kato and Akinori Nakayama were part of the Japanese ranks at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, with Takeshi's brother Sawao Kato , Eizo Kenmotsu and Mitsuo Tsukahara being new . In the third consecutive Olympic victory, the Japanese team was almost five points ahead of the Soviet team, fourteen points behind the gymnasts from the GDR received the bronze medal with 0.05 points ahead of the team from Czechoslovakia. In the individual standings, Sawao Katō won ahead of Mikhail Voronin, followed by three other Japanese with Nakayama, Kenmotsu and Takeshi Katō. Six gymnasts competed in the device finals, Takeshi Katō reached the final on four devices. He finished fifth in ring gymnastics and fourth in horse jumping and parallel bars . He won his only individual medal in floor exercise with bronze behind his brother and Akinori Nakayama.

The Japanese squad also won the 1970 World Gymnastics Championships in Ljubljana in the absence of Sawao Kato . Takuji Hayata and Fumio Honma complemented the Olympic champions Takeshi Katō, Eizō Kenmotsu, Akinori Nakayama and Mitsuo Tsukahara. The squad won with 6.75 points ahead of the Soviet team, the gymnasts from the GDR received the bronze medal as in 1966 and 1968. Besides team gold, Takashi Katō also won two bronze medals on the devices. In the horse jump Tsukahara won ahead of Wiktor Klimenko and Kato. With Nakayama, Kenmotsu and Katō three Japanese won all medals in floor exercise.

literature

• Volker Kluge : Summer Olympic Games. The Chronicle III. Mexico City 1968 – Los Angeles 1984 . Sportverlag Berlin 2000 ISBN 3-328-00741-5

Web links

• Takeshi Katō in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Gymnastics World Championships on sport-komplett.de