László Hódy (also known as László Hódi, Hódi László and Les Hody) (born July 10, 1934) was a Hungarian and Australian basketball player who competed for Hungary in the

1952 Summer Olympics The 1952 Summer Olympics ( fi, Kesäolympialaiset 1952; sv, Olympiska sommarspelen 1952), officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad ( fi, XV olympiadin kisat; sv, Den XV olympiadens spel) and commonly known as Helsinki 1952 ( sv, Helsin ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

in the

1964 Summer Olympics The , officially the and commonly known as Tokyo 1964 ( ja, 東京1964), were an international multi-sport event held from 10 to 24 October 1964 in Tokyo, Japan. Tokyo had been awarded the organization of the 1940 Summer Olympics, but this ho ...

, the first person to compete at the

Olympics The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...

for two countries. Hódy was part of the Hungarian basketball team, which was eliminated after the group stage of the 1952 tournament. He played three games. Hódy migrated to

where he took the name Les Hody and played for the Australia men's national basketball team.

Hungary

László Hódy was born in Szeged on July 10, 1934 to Janos and Agnes Hódy who owned the Hódy

shoe shop Shoemaking is the process of making footwear. Originally, shoes were made one at a time by hand, often by groups of shoemakers, or cobblers (also known as '' cordwainers''). In the 18th century, dozens or even hundreds of masters, journeymen ...

and factory. When Laszlo was 12, the artist Janos Vinkler painted ''Ket fiu'', a portrait of László and his older brother Janos. The brothers discovered basketball at school and were soon playing for Szeged Postas club in the first division. Laszlo then joined the Army teams Szeged Honved and Budapesti Honvéd and was selected to play for the Olympic team in Helsinki at the age of 17. Janos, and their younger brothers Zsolt and Szabolcs and their sister Ildiko, would also represent Hungary in sports. With the national team, László won a silver medal at the 1953 European Championship in Moscow and won the 1954 World University and European Championships.

Australia

After the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, László, his brother Janos and another

basketballer Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

Tibor Remai and Vera Neszmélyi, the 100m sprinter, all four European Champions, escaped together to Austria then

in 1957. There Laszlo and Vera married and settled in Adelaide. The brothers took the Australian names Les and John and played basketball for the newly created Budapest Basketball team. Les variously worked for, or owned in partnership with Vera, businesses in leatherwork, painting, assembling fridges, knitwear, fabric cutting, retail and truck driving. In 1963, Les gained

Australian nationality Australian nationality law details the conditions in which a person holds Australian legal nationality. The primary law governing nationality regulations is the Australian Citizenship Act 2007, which came into force on 1 July 2007 and is applic ...

, moved to Melbourne and was selected to play for Australia at the Tokyo Olympics where, at the age of 30, he was the second-highest scorer for Australia. In 1972, Les and Vera divorced and Les moved to New Zealand where he severed his Achilles’ tendon and ended his basketball career. Les worked as a painter, manager, driver and orchardist until, in 1975, he returned to Melbourne to become an egg farmer with his brothers John and Szabolcs. In 1983, Les married Eva Tar and together they established the cosmetics company Vogue Colours International which sold seasonal colour analysis,

Poppy King Poppy Cybele King (born 23 May 1972) is an Australian entrepreneur. She is best known for her company Poppy Industries and the range of cosmetics available at Poppy Stores in Australia, during the 1990s. Early life King was born to a A ...

and other beauty products. In 1995, Les, along with the rest of the 1955 European Championship team, received the Golden Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary. In 2012, Les was inducted into the Legends of the

Basketball Hall of Fame The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame is an American history museum and hall of fame, located at 1000 Hall of Fame Avenue in Springfield, Massachusetts. It serves as basketball's most complete library, in addition to promoting and pre ...

in Hungary. In 2015, as Laszlo Hody, he published his autobiography ''Not an Ordinary Life: From class enemy to Hall of Fame and a lifetime in between''.

References

External links

Personal Facebook pageNot an Ordinary Life - From class enemy to the hall of fame and a lifetime in between
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hodi, Laszlo 1934 births Living people Basketball players at the 1952 Summer Olympics Basketball players at the 1964 Summer Olympics Hungarian men's basketball players Australian men's basketball players Olympic basketball players of Hungary Olympic basketball players of Australia Sportspeople from Szeged