Viktor Fyodorovich Markin () (born 23 February 1957 in the village of Oktyabrsky,

Ust-Tarksky District Ust-Tarksky District (russian: Усть-Та́ркский райо́н) is an administrative and municipalLaw #200-OZ district (raion), one of the thirty in Novosibirsk Oblast, Russia. It is located in the west of the oblast. The area of the distr ...

Novosibirsk Oblast Novosibirsk Oblast (russian: Новосиби́рская о́бласть, ''Novosibirskaya oblast'') is a federal subject of Russia (an oblast) located in southwestern Siberia. Its administrative and economic center is the city of Novosibir ...

) is a former

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

athlete, winner of two gold medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics. After graduating from a secondary school he went to Novosibirsk, where he entered the Faculty of Pediatrics of the Institute of Medicine. Markin started athletics only at age 19 in the athletics section by the institute, coached by Aleksandr Bukhasheyev. He remained quite unknown until the Moscow

Olympic Games 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 vari ...

. On 27 April 1980, in Sochi, Markin ran a new personal best in the one lap event of 46.96 seconds. In early July Markin ran 45.34 at the

Central Lenin Stadium Luzhniki Stadium ( rus, стадион «Лужники», p=stədʲɪˈon lʊʐnʲɪˈkʲi, ''Stadion Luzhniki'') is the national stadium of Russia, located in its capital city, Moscow. The full name of the stadium is Grand Sports Arena of the ...

. In the Olympic final on July 30, Markin was only fifth at the halfway mark and as the final straight opened he was still three metres behind the leader

Frank Schaffer Frank Schaffer (born 23 October 1958 in Stalinstadt (today Eisenhüttenstadt), Bezirk Frankfurt) is an East German retired athlete who specialised in the 400 metres. He won the bronze medal in the 400 metres at the 1980 Summer Olympics ...

East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...

. But with a very strong finish Markin won with a European record and world season best 44.60 (still the Russian national record over 400 m). Markin captured his second

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

in the 4 × 400 m

relay A relay Electromechanical relay schematic showing a control coil, four pairs of normally open and one pair of normally closed contacts An automotive-style miniature relay with the dust cover taken off A relay is an electrically operated switch ...

when, as an anchor, he outran the winner of the 400 metre hurdles, East German Volker Beck. After a break from sports to complete his studies in

medicine Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pr ...

, Markin returned at the European Championships in 1982, where he won two bronze medals (400 m and 4 × 400 m relay). At the inaugural

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the capital, primate, and most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of Uusimaa in southern Finland, and has a population of . The city ...

Markin, the only Soviet competing in the individual 400 metres (as the rest were concentrating on the relay), was knocked out of the final in an extremely close

photo finish A photo finish occurs in a sporting race when multiple competitors cross the finishing line at nearly the same time. As the naked eye may not be able to determine which of the competitors crossed the line first, a photo or video taken at the finis ...

by eventual bronze medalist Sunder Nix of the United States. However, he finished on a high note as in the last event of the Championships, the 4 × 400 m relay, the Soviets won an unexpected gold.

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

already lost their winning chances on the first leg as Erwin Skamrahl (who had broken Markin's European record just three weeks earlier) gave up more than ten meters to Sergey Lovachov; the other main favorites, United States, hung with the Soviets for two and a half legs until Willie Smith tumbled and fell, leaving Markin an easy job to anchor home a USSR victory. Markin decided to retire after hearing the Soviet decision to boycott the

1984 Summer Olympics The 1984 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXIII Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1984) were an international multi-sport event held from July 28 to August 12, 1984, in Los Angeles, California, United States. It marked the sec ...

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Markin, Viktor 1957 births Living people People from Novosibirsk Oblast Russian male sprinters Soviet male sprinters Olympic athletes of the Soviet Union Athletes (track and field) at the 1980 Summer Olympics Olympic gold medalists for the Soviet Union World Athletics Championships medalists European Athletics Championships medalists Medalists at the 1980 Summer Olympics Olympic gold medalists in athletics (track and field) Universiade medalists in athletics (track and field) Universiade gold medalists for the Soviet Union World Athletics Championships winners Medalists at the 1981 Summer Universiade Medalists at the 1983 Summer Universiade Friendship Games medalists in athletics Sportspeople from Novosibirsk Oblast Novosibirsk State Medical University alumni