Belarusian Athletes in a Variety of Sports

Search the A Belarus Miscellany Web site

• Officers of the Belarusian Olympic Committee

  Contact information, including street, phone, fax, and e-mail (do they really use it?) is at the Official Olympics Web site: http://www.olympic.org/ioc/e/org/noc/cno/BLR_e.html

  
  

• Sports Publications (Periodicals)

  
  

• Results & Links to the Sydney 2000 Olympics Web sites

  
  

• Results of 1996 Summer Olympics (Atlanta, Georgia, USA)

Names and Sports of Belarusian Athletes (not restricted to Olympic Athletes)

• Track & Field
• Boxing
• Gymnastics
• Swimming
• Diving
• Rowing
• Canoe / Kayak
• Yachting (Sailing)
• Weightlifting
• Wrestling
• Shooting

• Soccer (Football)

• Hockey
  • Junior Hockey

• Basketball

• Tennis

• Table Tennis

• Cross-Country (Nordic) Skiing

• Ice Skating

NOTE: The following athletes are listed simply as having competed internationally in the following categories. This list does not consititute the official Belarusian entrants in the 1996 Olympics.

• Track & Field

  • Men's 20 KM Walk

    Robert Korzeniowski (1996 Olympics, 8th Place: 1:21:13)

  • Men's Pole Vault

    Dmitriy Markov (1996 Olympics, 6th Place: 19'2 3/4")

  • Men's Decathlon

    Eduard Hamalainen (1995 world runner-up)

  • Men's Discuss Throw

    Vladimir Dubrovshchik (1996 Olympics, Silver medal)

    Vasiliy Kaptyukh (1996 Olympics, Bronze medal)

  • Men's Hammer Throw

    Igor Astapkovich (runner-up finishes at both the world championships and 1992 Olympic Games)

    Aleksandr Krasko

    Sergey Alay

  • Men's Shotput

    Dmitriy Goncharuk (1996 Olympics, 9th Place: 64' 11 3/4")

    
    

  • Women's 400 Meter Run

    Anna Kozak

  • Women's 800 Meter Run

    Natasha Dukhnova

  • Women's 400 Meter Hurdles

    Nelli Voronkova

    Tanya Kurochkina

    Tanya Ledovskaya

  • Women's 10 KM Walk

    Olya Kardapoltseva (1996 Olympics, 7th Place: 43:02)

    Valya Tsybulskaya (1996 Olympics, 9th Place: 43:21)

  • Women's Marathon

    Yelena Mazovka (1996 Olympics, 24th Place: 2:36:22)

    Natasha Galushko (1996 Olympics, 50th Place: 2:44:21)

    Madina Biktagirova (1996 Olympics, DNF)

  • Women's Heptathlon

    Natasha Sazanovich (1996 Olympics, Silver medal)

  • Women's Discus Throw

    Ellena (Elya) Zvereva (1995 world title; 1996 Olympics, Bronze medal)

    Lyudmila Filimonova

  • Women's Javelin Throw

    Natalya Shikolenko (silver medal in 1992 and won the 1995 world championship)

• Boxing
  Lightweight, Serguei Ostrochapkine

  Welterweight, Vadim Mezga

• Gymnastics

  Links to Other Web sites:

  • The Unofficial Olga Korbut Web site   (http://members.tripod.com/~avengerfx/korbut/)

    Ms. Korbut is from Hrodna (Grodno), Belarus, and her performance for the USSR in the 1972 Munich Olympics has had an immeasurable effect on gymnastics. (She emigrated to the US in 1991.) She has also worked to raise funds for Chornobyl relief.

    Olga Korbut's entry at the World Sport Gymnastic Hall of Fame

    Olga Korbut's entry on MSN Encarta.

  • Svetlana Boguinskaia's (Boginskaya) Official Web site   (http://www.svetlanaboguinskaia.com/     Soviet gymnast from Mensk, Belarus)

    Having first represented the USSR, Ms. Boguinskaia represented Belarus in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. (She has emigrated to the US.)

    Other fan Web sites: http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Court/2697/BOGI.HTML   --   http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Field/2489/   --   http://members.aol.com/gapershi2/svetlana.htm

  • Vitaly Scherbo's entry at the World Sport Gymnastic Hall of Fame   ( http://archive.www.worldsport.com/worldsport/sports/gymnastics/profiles/scherbo.html     from Mensk, Belarus)

    • Also: Vitaly Scherbo Web site   (a fan's page in Spanish with some photo's: http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Track/9043/scher1.htm     from Mensk, Belarus)

  • "Gymbox" entry for Belarus   (http://www.gymbox.net/belarus.htm)

    • Includes information about several Belarusian gymnasts, with a few links to other pages. Includes at least mention of: Svetlana Baitova, Svetlana Boguinskaya, Elena Piskoun, the Yurkina twins (Yulia and Olga), and Olga Korbut. Featured photo's of: Alyona Polozkova and Inna Poklonskaya.

  • Photo's of Belarusian Gymnasts   (http://members.aol.com/Shanfan14/belarus.html)

    • A fan's Web site with photo's of (women) gymnasts, including a section about Belarusian gymnasts. (Note: Most (all?) photo's are captured from TV and are of poor quality.) Belarusian gymnasts include: Elena Piskun, Alena Polozkova, Olga Yurkina, Svetlana Tarasevich, Elena Savko, Ludmilla Vitiukova, Yulia Yurkina, Tatiana Zharganova, Olga Korbut, and Svetlana Boginskaya.

  
  

  • Men's Gymnastics

    Vitali Scherbo, six-time Olympic gold medalist--perhaps the greatest male gymnast of all time--has won a record 14 world championship gold medals in his career. In Atlanta, he will be defending titles in the all-round event, on the pommel horse, the rings, the vault and the parallel bars.

    A news story about Irina Scherbo's (wife of Vitali) near-fatal car accident (includes other quotations of a very "confident" sounding Vitali, who lives in the US, not Belarus). "In Atlanta, Scherbo will be defending titles in the all-round event, on the pommel horse, the rings, the vault and the parallel bars."   Link to the news story   (FYI: Article is not longer available on the WWW; April, 1999.)

    Ivan Ivankov, due to a tendon injury, will not compete. Refer to the following for news story CNN story of July 10, 1996 concerning Ivankov's injury   (FYI: Article is not longer available on the WWW.)

  • Men's Individual All-Around

    Vitali Scherbo (1996 Olympics, Bronze medal; 58.197 points)

  • Men's Horizontal Bar

    Vitali Scherbo (1996 Olympics, Bronze medal; 3-way tie)

  • Men's Parallel Bars

    Vitali Scherbo (1996 Olympics, Bronze medal)

  • Men's Vault

    Vitali Scherbo (1992 champion; 1996 Olympics, Bronze medal)

  • Men's Floor Exercises

    Vitali Scherbo (world champion)

  • Women's Vault

    Yelena Piskun (former world champion, 1993, is always a threat in this event with her raw power)

  • Women's Gymnastics-Rhythmic

    Larissa Lukyanenko (1996 Olympics, 7th place; 38.666 points)

    Tatiana Ogryzko (1996 Olympics, 8th place; 38.530 points)

• Swimming
  • Women's 50M Freestyle

    Yelena Popchenko

  • Women's 100M Breaststroke

    Yelena Rudkovskaya

  • Women's 100M Freestyle

    Svetlana Zhidko

  • Women's 200M Freestyle

    Inga Borodich

  • Men's 100M Breaststroke

    Aleksey Kriventsov

  • Men's 200M Breaststroke

    Aleksandr Gukov

  • Men's 1500M Freestyle

    Sergey Mikhnovets

• Diving

  • Men's Platform

    Serguei Koudrevitch (1996 Olympics, 11th place; 528.00 points)

• Rowing

  • Women's Single Sculls

    Yekaterina Khodotovich (1996 Olympics, Gold medal; 7:32.21)

  • Women's Eight Oars with Coxswain

    1996 Olympics, Bronze medal; 6:24.44

    Members of Belarus' Team:
    SKRABATUN, Valentina
    DAVYDENKO, Tamara
    STASYUK, Natalya
    VOLCHEK, Natalya
    ZNAK, Marina
    MIKULICH, Yelena
    LAVRINENKO, Natalya
    PANKINA, Aleksandra
    PAVLOVICH, Yaroslava

• Canoe / Kayak

  • Women's (Kayak) K-1 Slalom

    Elena Kurzina (1996 Olympics, 25th place; 225.14)

  • Canoe/Kayak, Sprint: Men's Canoe Doubles 500 m

    Aleksandr Maseykov and Dmitriy Dovgalyonok (1996 Olympics, 9th place; 1:46.84)

• Yachting (Sailing)

  • Laser Class

    Aleksandr Zelenovskiy (1996 Olympics, 20th place; 163 points)

  • Star Class

    ???????? (1996 Olympics, 23rd place; 162 points)

  • Europe Class

    Anastasia Podobed (1996 Olympics, 26th place; 219 points)

  • Tornado Class

    ???????? (1996 Olympics, 14th place; 101 points)

• Weightlifting
  • 76 KG

    Leonid Lobachov (1996 Olympics, 8th Place: 753.50)

    Oleg Kechko (1996 Olympics, 9th Place: 737.001)

  • Super-Heavyweight (Over 108 KG)

    Alexander Kurlovich (has 2 Gold medals; 1996 Olympics, 5th Place: 937)

  • Miscellaneous

    Leanid Taranenka

• Wrestling
  • 105.5 lb (48 kg)

    Aleksandr Pavlov (1996 Olympics, Silver medal)

  • 114.5 lb (52 kg)

    German Kontoev

  • 125.5 lb (57 kg)

    Alexander Gouzov

  • 136.5 lb (62 kg)

    Sergei Smal (World Champion at 125.5 pounds in 1991, and was second in the 1994 World meet at this weight class)

  • 149.5 lb (68 kg)

    Karmandar Madzhidov

  • 180.5 lb (82 kg)

    Valery Tsilent (1996 Olympics, Bronze medal)

    Alexander Savko

  • 220 lb (100 kg)

    Sergey Lishtvan (1996 Olympics, Silver medal)

    Sergei Kovalevski

  • 286 lb (130 kg)

    Alexei Medvedev (third in the World in 1994; 1996 Olympics, Silver medal)

• Shooting
  • Men's Free Pistol

    Igor Basinski (1996 Olympics, Silver medal)

  • Men's Free Rifle Prone

    Serguei Martynov (1996 Olympics, 6th place; 699.60 points)

  • Men's Three-Position Rifle

    Serguei Martynov (1996 Olympics, 8th place; 1263.90 points)

  • Women's Air Rifle

    Olga Pogrebniak (1996 Olympics, 5th place; 496.4 points)

  • Miscellaneous

    Iryna Shylava - a former Olympic champion

Soccer (Football)

Hockey

• Players from Belarus:
  Ruslan Salei   (Professional hockey in the USA: Anaheim Mighty Ducks, NHL)

• General Ice Hockey Web page: IIHF home page

• Usenet Newsgroups: rec.sport.hockey

• Links on the Web include  
  • Planet Hockey: Belarus   (Warning: This is a Yahoo/GeoCities Web site. Very brief information, mainly who won the annual championship.)

  • World Hockey Results from Yahoo   (FYI: Article is not longer available on the WWW; April, 1999.)

  • CNNSI.com - 2002 Winter Olympics; Saturday February 23, 2002   Russia beats Belarus for the Bronze medal, 7 - 2.

  For Example (April 21, 1997):

  Ice hockey-World championship pool B results

  "KATOWICE, Poland, April 21 (Reuter) - Results on the final day of world ice hockey pool B matches on Monday:"

  Belarus 6 Britain 2 (1-0 4-1 1-1)

  Scorers:

  Belarus - Viktor Karatchoun 3, 10, Alexei Lojkin 34, 37, Andrei Rassolko 30, Alexandre Makritski 60.

  Britain - Andre Malo 24, Douglas McEwen 56.

  Final standings:

                        P    W    D     L     F    A    Pts
  
       1. Belarus       7    7    0     0    48   21    14
  

Junior Hockey

The Belarus team won first place at the World Junior Hockey Championships in Pool B and will play in Pool A next year (1999).

There is some more info at World Junior Hockey - Pool B, including some game information about each nation competing.   (FYI: Article is not longer available on the WWW; April, 1999.)

There is some additional info at the World Junior Hockey Home page, including 1998-99 Belarus Team Roster

Men's Basketball

• Belarusian Basketball   at the Euro Basketball Web site

  Belarusian National Team Roster (at same Web site as above)

  Belarusian Teams

  1. RTI Mensk (Web link includes player roster)
     
  2. Hrodna '93 (Web link includes player roster)
     
  3. Avtozavodets Mensk
     
  4. Sozh Gomel
     
  5. RUOR Mensk
     
  6. Temp Mogilev
     
  7. OZAA Osipovichi
     
  8. Shikom Vitebsk

  
  

• I am told that four Belarusian basketball players were attending George Washington University (fall, 1996; Washington, DC, USA), and that at least one of them (Alexander Koul) will probably enter the NBA through the draft next year (it didn't happen). Three of the four players include:
  • Alexander Koul   -- currently playing Pro Basketball in Turkey ('98 - '99)
    WWW.KOUL.COM   (probably not maintained)

    Koul's Stats while at GWU

    Koul's NBA Draft Prospect File

    An Interview with Alexander Koul   (published: Dec. 1998)

  • Yegor Mescheriakov

  • Andrei Krivonos' Web page
    Appears not to be maintained, nor worked on in years.
    • Andrei Krivonos NCAA Tournament Statistics   (1998 ? )

  • Valeri Khomenia (1998-99 ? )

Women's Basketball

• Not much here yet; let me know if you have more information.

  Spotlight on Elena Kravchenko   Who's from Belarus, at the University of Virginia.

Tennis

Links to other Tennis-related Web sites:

• Official Olga Barabanschikova Web site

• A Web site dedicated to: Natasha Zvereva, including a mailing list.
  Note: It's a GeoCities-based Web site, thus has those annoying advertising windows that keep popping up. . . .

• ITF player database

• Wimbledon   (Refer to their player database for brief bio's and rankings of Belarusian players)

• The WTA Tour singles rankings by country   from the Yahoo Web site, but no longer online;   from April 21, 1997

                                             TOTAL     BONUS     # OF
  COUNTRY  RANK NAME                         POINTS    POINTS   TOURN
  
  5. BELARUS
     1.     43 ZVEREVA, NATASHA              533.3929   182.5     16
     2.     95 BARABANSCHIKOVA, OLGA         258.3000    77.8     20
     3.    290 POUTCHEK, TATIANA              49.5000    20.0     10
     4.    333 IGNATIEVA, TATIANA             41.5000     5.5      5
     5.    394 GLOUSCHENKO, OLGA              29.4500     3.5     15
     6.    513 ZHUKOVETS, VERA                16.8000      .0     10
     7.    560 OSTROVSKAYA, NADEJDA           12.0000     1.0      7
     8.    692 STETS, MARINA                   6.5500      .0      7
     9.    763 KAZAKEVITCH, ANNA               4.8500      .5      7
    10.    978 SOKOLENKO, JANA                 1.9000      .0      5
    11.   1008 GRIB, ANTONINA                  1.6500      .0      3
  
  

  
  

• Women's Tennis Career Prize Money Leaders   Posted on CNN/SI: Mon April 5, 1999 at 6:01 a.m EDT

   1 GRAF, STEFFI              $20,920,759
   2 NAVRATILOVA, MARTINA      $20,344,061
   3 SANCHEZ VICARIO, ARANTXA  $14,160,926
   4 SELES, MONICA             $11,130,000
   5 NOVOTNA, JANA             $10,836,061
   6 HINGIS, MARTINA            $9,300,817
   7 EVERT, CHRIS               $8,896,195
   8 SABATINI, GABRIELA         $8,785,850
   9 MARTINEZ, CONCHITA         $7,840,127
  
  10 ZVEREVA, NATASHA           $7,185,842  <<<<<-----
  
  11 DAVENPORT, LINDSAY         $7,040,266
  12 SUKOVA, HELENA             $6,391,245
  13 SHRIVER, PAM               $5,460,566
  14 FERNANDEZ, MARY JOE        $5,085,843
  15 FERNANDEZ, GIGI            $4,681,906
  16 GARRISON JACKSON, ZINA     $4,590,816
  17 TAUZIAT, NATHALIE          $4,128,174
  18 PIERCE, MARY               $4,074,176
  19 NEILAND, LARISA            $3,797,814
  20 MAJOLI, IVA                $3,501,128
  
   © 1999 Sportsticker Enterprises, LP
  

  
  

• "Gigi Fernandez is the most accomplished doubles player in the field. She and Natasha Zvereva of Belarus have been one of the more formidable tandems in recent years, having captured three Wimbledon titles (1992-94), four French Opens (1992-1995), two Australian Open crowns (1993-94), and two U.S. Open titles (1992, 1995)."
  from the CNN/Sports Illustrated Women's Sports Web Page but no longer online.

  
  

• Olga Barabanschikova (competes as a doubles partner with Natasha Zvereva; also competes as an individual)

• Tatiana Pouitchek   (also Poutchek)
  TASHKENT, Uzbekistan (AP) -- Maria-Gianeh Mikaelian of Switzerland captured her first WTA title Sunday (June 16, 2002), defeating Tatiana Poutchek of Belarus (WTA ranking: 67) in the final match of the US$140,000 Tashkent Open tennis tournament.

  
  

• Vladimir Voltchkov - winner of 1996 Junior Wimbledon

• Max Mirny

Table Tennis

• From the Yahoo Web site, Yahoo - Table tennis-Chinese set to dominate again   April 23, 1997, but no longer online.

  "MANCHESTER, England, April 23 (Reuter) - It will need more than acupuncture to cure the malaise affecting table tennis if China complete a second successive clean sweep at the world championships starting on Thursday."

  ". . . There are four other Europeans in the top 10 - the rapidly improving Vladimir Samsonov of Belarus at number four, Belgium's 1993 losing finalist Jean-Michel Saive (8), Germany's Jorg Rosskopf (9) and Croatian Zoran Primorac (10)."

Cross-Country (Nordic) Skiing

• Excerpt from the Yahoo Web site, Dolidovich Wins Cross Country Finale   Sunday, March 25, 2001, 11:35 AM ET, but may not be available online.

  "KUOPIO, Finland (AP) - With World Cup overall champion Per Elofsson not competing, Sergei Dolidovich of Belarus was the surprising winner Sunday of the season finale on the men's cross country circuit. "

  "Dolidovich covered the 60 kilometers - the longest distance in the World Cup - in 2 hours, 33 minutes, 51.9 seconds. Pietro Piller Cottrer of Italy was beaten by 2.1 seconds in the mass start race, but gained points to finish fourth in the overall standings."

  "This was Dolidovich's first top-three finish in the World Cup. His best previous showing was 10th in a 15K freestyle in December. He was 12th in the 50K in the 1997 world championships. . . ."

Ice Skating

• Julia Soldatova