Life and Experiences of Pentathlete Gábor Benedek
1 2016-12-11T20:41:11-08:00 Johanna Mellis 337c8aa15975253503108a6ba2daff82d0111139 12595 1 plain 2016-12-11T20:41:11-08:00 Johanna Mellis 337c8aa15975253503108a6ba2daff82d0111139This page is referenced by:
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Case #3: Gábor Benedek
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The Melbourne Olympic Games began a mere two weeks after the 1956 Revolution ended. The athletes themselves did not find out about the Soviet invasion and crushing of the rebellion until after they arrived in Australia. Many of the athletes at that point decided not to return to Hungary.[1] The Hungarian Olympic team formed a Revolutionary Committee as a sort of sport counterpart to the numerous revolutionary committees and councils that were created during the Revolution itself.
On of the elected leaders of the Revolutionary committee was pentathlete Gábor Benedek, shown above. He won a gold medal at the 1952 Olympics, and was the champion at the 1953 and 1954 World Pentathlon Championships. When he returned to Hungary after Melbourne, Benedek was forced into retirement by the Hungarian Physical Education and Sport, and stripped of his privileges. By 1959 he was allowed to begin training young pentathletes, several of whom went on to have enormously successful careers. Benedek ended up defecting to West Germany in 1969.
Although it is not clear why, Benedek's coaching career never took off the way it did for Dezső Gyarmati, the other leader of the Revolutionary Committee. Perhaps if Benedek had not left Hungary in 1969, he could have regained his status within Hungarian sport as an expert coach in modern pentathlon.
[1] Freedom’s Fury, documentary, 2006.