The great Soviet weightlifter Yuri Vlasov.

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A humorous cartoon dedicated to Yuri Vlasov's victory at the Olympic Games in Rome. "Pravda" newspaper, Leningrad.

 

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A humorous drawing dedicated to the Soviet athletes who won the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome. Yuri Vlasov is in front. Artist: G. Pirtskhalava.

 

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Pictured are Soviet weightlifters Arkady Vorobyov and Yuri Vlasov.

 

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“After failures and tragedies, to always strive for a new victory means refusing to accept oneself as defeated. This is the true triumph — yours and of the cause itself.”
(Yury Vlasov, “A Confluence of Difficult Circumstances”)

 

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“I denied the power of illness over myself.
I had to move. Training and running were still beyond my reach, so in autumn, winter, and spring I decided to master walking, and only then return to training. And nothing — and no one — would stop me.
The first walks… eight to twelve minutes of pacing near the entrance of the building. I had no strength for more. I would be drenched in sweat, and nausea would set in. During those first weeks my wife and daughter walked with me. They carried spare clothes — in case I started shivering or the wind cut through me. Yes, yes, I was pitiful and even ridiculous. I was like that — but not my determination. It grew stronger with every hour. I saw the future, and in it — myself.”
(Yury Vlasov, “A Confluence of Difficult Circumstances”)

 

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From left to right: Yuri Vlasov, his wife, Alexander Kurynov (friend and teammate of the Central Sports Club "Burevestnik"), Viktor Polyakov, master of sports in discus throwing and one of the strongest weightlifters of the USSR, city of Dubno, before Tokyo, 1964 (archive of V.P. Kalinin).

 

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“Developing the habit of physical work is almost always a painful and burdensome process. Most people abandon training after, say, three to five weeks. Why voluntarily torment oneself with running or lifting weights? Because, as it turns out, it is labor.
The habit of training is by no means a purely mechanical process. At the initial stage (perhaps five or six months… perhaps even a year), forcing oneself to train is not easy — what pleasure can there be? A person understands that training is necessary and drives himself into running or exercises.
But at some point, when certain physical qualities have been developed — endurance, strength, agility — training begins to bring pleasure. And the higher the level of fitness, the more pronounced this feeling becomes. It is precisely this feeling, and not merely the awareness that physical exertion is necessary, that binds a person to training.
A person experiences satisfaction from mastery over his body, from endurance in movement, from strength in exercises with weights. He is freed from weaknesses and motor limitations inherent in flabbiness, and this is inevitably accompanied by a restructuring of the psyche. Self-confidence grows noticeably stronger, certain character traits become more sharply defined — new and useful ones — and life reveals itself from an unknown side. All this softens, and later significantly weakens, the need to force oneself.
In the end, a person’s actions are guided not so much by physical necessity as by psychological motivation.
But to reach this point, one must overcome in training the threshold of coercion, based on the conscious understanding of the need to keep the body and its systems in proper order.”**
(Yury Vlasov, “The Price of Life”)

 

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USSR. Podolsk. September 3, 1964. Yuri Vlasov. 6 world records. 135.5 kilograms.

 

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“Once, in Beethoven’s biography, I read his complaint — a moan:
‘O Providence… grant me at least one day of pure joy!’
I took it for a beautiful exaggeration. But what did I know of suffering? Now I perceive the torment of every word and every musical note with my entire body, with every particle of myself…
But what have I become! My hands tremble, my head trembles, my speech is impaired. I forget words, confuse names, events, familiar terms; I speak indistinctly.
For several years now I have been unable to lower my head deeply — pain in the spine blocks the movement. At night I so often feel unwell that for the last three years I have not turned off the light at all. And there is also the motion sickness! I have begun to suffer terribly from motion sickness in cars and the metro; I feel nauseous even in an elevator.
I am changing physically to such an extent that people no longer recognize me. I can stand next to someone who knew me well just a few years ago and remain unrecognized. I sit almost shoulder to shoulder in the stands with Viktor Kurentsov — and he does not recognize me, although we competed on the same national team and trained together so many times! There are more than enough such examples.
When I entered a room at the Beijing Hotel to see a well-known Italian director — the author of a film about the Olympic Games in Rome — he looked at me with incomprehension. And when I introduced myself, saying that I had come at his request, he still stared at me in bewilderment. When it finally dawned on him who stood before him, he could not conceal his deep astonishment at the changes in me.
With each passing day, contempt for myself grows within me. I look into the mirror — and I am repulsed by the person who has brought himself to such shameful wretchedness!
In what is happening to me, I myself am guilty above all. I am weak and insufficiently strong — that is all! One must be worthy of struggle, must know how to oppose the pressure of circumstances, breakdowns, and exhaustion from work with a certain mode of conduct. And I? … I saw nothing except my misfortunes and ailments. I broke myself through my own fault. I failed to hold myself properly, failed to subordinate circumstances. I am precisely pitiful!..
Many such thoughts pass through my mind. And all of them reduce to one thing: the strengthening of contempt for oneself — and this, in itself, is creative, for it erases the power of the most influential forces: illness and fear.”
(Yury Vlasov, “The Formula of Courage”)

 

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Painting by artist Alexey Akindinov
“Champion” — dedicated to the Soviet weightlifter Yury Vlasov
90 × 74 cm, oil on canvas, 1996–2021
Official website of the artist:
akindinov.com
Note: Artist Alexey Akindinov. Short biography
Born in 1977 in the city of Ryazan, Russia.
1988–1992 — Studied at Children’s Art School No. 1 (Ryazan).
1992–1998 — Studied at the Ryazan Art College named after G. K. Wagner. Graduated with a specialization in painting.
Since 2001 — Member of the Union of Artists of Russia and the International Association of Art (AIAP UNESCO), Painting Section.
Since 2007 — Member of the International Art Fund and the Moscow Union of Artists; specialization — painting.
2010 — Member of the “New York Realism” Artists’ Union, New York, USA. Fine Art Studio “NEW YORK REALISM”, USA.
2008 — Laureate of the National Award in the field of contemporary visual art of Russia, “Russian Gallery of the 21st Century”.
Awarded the Silver Medal “Russian Gallery of the 21st Century” in the category Genre Painting.
Venue: Moscow, Federation Council of the Russian Federation.

 

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“Failure leaves its mark: in one’s feelings, in one’s behavior, in one’s attitude toward extreme exertion and the competition setting. There is no success without overcoming this subconscious distrust of oneself, this ingrained habit of doubt. One must break oneself and not allow instincts to take root.”
(Yury Vlasov, “The Justice of Strength”)

 

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Yuri Vlasov badge. USSR.

 

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Yuri Vlasov badge. USSR.

 

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