Vitaly Alexandrovich Petrakow

Vitaly Alexandrowitsch Petrakow ( Russian Виталий Александрович Петраков ; born December 10, 1954 in Tula ) is a former Soviet cyclist who was the 1980 Olympic champion in the team pursuit .

Life

At the 1975 World Cycling Championships in Liège, the Soviet four-man with Vladimir Ossokin , Alexander Perow , Vitali Petrakow and Viktor Sokolow won the silver medal behind the four from the Federal Republic of Germany. A year later at the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal , both teams faced each other again in the final, the Soviet four, starting in the same line-up as in the previous year, was again defeated by the West German four.

From 1977 to 1979, the four-wheeler from the GDR won the world championship three times in a row. While the Soviet team could not win a medal in 1977, the four-man was more successful in Munich in 1978 . Together with Wassili Ehrlich and Igor Pilipenko, Ossokin and Petrakow reached the final against the GDR. In 1979 the Soviet four consisted of Ehrlich, Viktor Manakow , Ossokin and Petrakow, these four drivers reached the world championship final in Amsterdam and again won silver behind the GDR four.

At the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow , Valery Mowtschan moved up into the foursome for Ehrlich. In the quarter-finals, the Soviet four-man beat the Australians in 4: 14.64 minutes, undercutting the almost twelve-year-old world record set by the German four-man at the Olympic Games in Mexico City. After the semi-final victory against the four from Czechoslovakia, the four Soviet drivers were in the final, the opponent was the world champion from the GDR, who had changed two positions. The Soviet four-man won the final in 4: 15.70 minutes, again falling below the old world record.

Web links

• Vitaly Petrakov in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• World Championships in Team Pursuit