From the federation
More Attention to the Work of the Federation
English summary of Tyazhelaya Atletika. Ezhegodnik 1986 (Moscow: Fizkultura i Sport, 1986), pp. 3–4: the text is paraphrased, not translated.
The centenary of weightlifting in the country was marked in 1985 with press articles by leading lifters, coaches and veterans, badges, medals, pennants, posters, envelopes and commemorative competitions, which popularised the sport. The all-Union federation's reporting and election plenum at the end of the year noted real progress over five years: 375,000 people now train in weightlifting and about 500,000 more in kettlebell lifting and athletic gymnastics. There are over 3,100 full-time coaches (about 2,000 with higher physical-education degrees), 1,316 specialised gyms and 72,000 pupils in sports schools. In five years about 100 athletes first met the international-class Master of Sport standard and 2,500 became Masters of Sport of the USSR; 80 judges gained the all-Union category and 27 the international one. Soviet lifters set 151 world records, won 19 gold, 16 silver and 3 bronze medals at four world championships and 5 gold and 5 silver at Friendship-84. Following the Party and government resolution on mass physical culture, kettlebell norms and rules were issued, and 1985 saw the first USSR championship and two judges' seminars.
Many problems of organisation, methodology, agitation, propaganda and ideological education remain, and the federation's capacity to tackle them is underused. The propaganda commission, chaired by A. V. Gavrilovets, surges around competitions and then falls quiet: the central press ran about 70 items in the two weeks of the world championships and two in the next two months. The commission, whose chairman also heads the weightlifting commission of the journalists' union AIPS, coordinates journalists and press work at championships. More now write on the sport: D. Ivanov, Yu. Khromov and A. Gavrilovets have been joined by Yu. Vanyat, I. Sosnovsky, A. Sklyarenko, V. Gorbunov, A. Krivopaltsev, S. Vartanyan and others, and members have helped produce programmes and reference books and write for the IWF journal World Weightlifting.
Yet problem-oriented and critical writing is still scarce. Coaching in the regions, reserve training and other pressing issues go unexamined, and former champions, leading coaches and doctors write little. There are few good sketches showing athletes and coaches as people shaped by Soviet sport, and little on training with weights for health; kettlebell notes have only just begun. Television, the most effective means of propaganda, still broadcasts unsatisfactory weightlifting programmes. These are faults of the whole federation, and promotion must be everyone's business.
Other bodies have equally important tasks. The education commission (V. A. Polyakov) must become more active, since some athletes break discipline or act immorally, a failing of team education. Together with the veterans' council (N. I. Shatov), it should make ideological work in all national squads and sports schools constant and purposeful.
Only two years remain before the Seoul Olympics, so the federation must control all preparations closely. The coaching council (E. P. Starikov) and the commissions for reserves (E. E. Rysin), kettlebell lifting and athletic gymnastics (R. P. Moroz) and material supply (L. S. Valkov), along with the all-Union judges' panel (N. V. Nesterov), must also step up. The federation should keep regular contact with the republican federations, hear their reports, help them practically and revive the contests for best gym, coaches and judges.
The new chairman is the former lifter, now writer, Yuri Petrovich Vlasov. The presidium includes K. F. Artemyev, A. S. Medvedev, L. I. Zhabotinsky, V. I. Alekseyev, D. A. Rigert and others, with P. A. Poletaev, a USSR Sports Committee coach, as executive secretary. They are experienced and enterprising, and the federation can be expected to meet its tasks.