Aleksey Vakhonin
Aleksey Ivanovich Vakhonin (Aleksei Vakhonin) was a Russian weightlifter who competed for the Soviet Union. He was born on March 10, 1935, in Gavrilovka, Kemerovo Oblast. After his father died in World War II, his family was very poor. He left school to work as a miner and, troubled by bad habits, fell into alcohol and smoking. A turning point came when the famous lifter Rudolf Plyukfelder noticed his potential and brought him to train and work in Kiselevsk. Plyukfelder spent years helping Vakhonin become a strong athlete.
Vakhonin’s rise in weightlifting was rapid. In 1961 he became the national champion, defeating the then five-time world champion Vladimir Stogov. He won the world bantamweight title in 1963 with a total of 345 kg. The peak of his career came at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. In a dramatic contest against Imre Foldi, Foldi led after the snatch and clean and press and even set a world record in the clean and jerk at 135 kg. Vakhonin answered with a 137.5 kg lift, and then needed 142.5 kg to win. He achieved it and, as he stood with the weight overhead, lifted one leg in a stork-like pose to show that the celebration could still be premature and that he could lift more if needed.
Vakhonin continued to succeed on the world stage, reclaiming world glory in 1966 in Berlin after a setback in Tehran in 1965. He earned three world titles (1963, 1964, 1966) and three European titles (1963, 1965, 1966), along with six national championships. He set six world records (five in the clean and jerk and one in the total) and held many national records. In 1964 he was awarded the Order of the Badge of Honour.
He retired from sport in 1970 to work again as a miner and to coach weightlifting. Later he again struggled with alcohol, and he died in a brawl in 1993 in Shakhty, Russia, at the age of 58. In 1994 a weightlifting tournament was started in his honor in Shakhty, where he spent his last years.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 08:04 (CET).