Matthias Steiner (马蒂亚斯·施泰纳) is born at August 25, 1982 in Vienna, Austria. He is an Austrian-German weightlifter, and also Beijing 2008 Olympic Games gold medalist in the sport of Men's Super heavyweight Weightlifting.
In 2005, Steiner left the Austrian weightlifting federation, and married a German woman. His wife, Susann encouraged him to continue participating in competitions. He promised Susann to take part in the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. Susann had always been his greatest source of power.
Sadly, in July of 2007, his wife died in a car accident. Steiner had been down to the bottom after the death of Susann. However, he regained his will soon after he remembered the promise between he and his wife.
During the Olympic competition, three heavyweight lifters, from Germany, Russia and Latvia, were locked in a duel in the clean-and-jerk final, alternating at attempts to lift upward of 550 pounds over their heads.
Steiner failed in his third snatch attempt, and with 203 kg ranked fourth after the snatch. Ščerbatihs was in position to take the lead in the clean and jerk, but failed in his second attempt. Steiner also failed in his first clean and jerk attempt, and Chigishev took the lead with 250 kg in the clean and jerk. Ščerbatihs failed in his third attempt, which would have forced Steiner to increase his last attempt to 258 kg in order to win gold.
Steiner decided to put everything on the line for his last clean-and-jerk. With a successful clean and jerk of 258 kg, and a total of 461 kg, Steiner became Olympic gold medalist. It was heartbreaking and wonderful all at once. The weightlifter fulfilled a promise by winning the gold medal for her.
"There was so much emotion that I cannot describe," Steiner told reporters. "It was, after a few weeks last year, a big motivation to fight for the gold medal. For her. For friends, for family."
Steiner stood on the medalists' podium with a photo of his late wife, who would otherwise have accompanied him to the Games.
1 comments:
Love moves one to accomplish feats.
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