Alexander Pusch

Alexander Pusch was one of the most successful West German épée fencers in the late 1970s and the 1980s. He would have won even more Olympic medals if the Moskva Games in 1980 had not been boycotted. He earned the individual épée gold in Montréal 1976 and added a team silver. In 1984 he came back to Los Angeles and won team gold and finished seventh in the individual contest. Four years later at Seoul he again won a team silver and placed ninth in the individual event.

At the World Championships Pusch won individual gold medals in 1975 and 1978, adding team golds in 1985 and 1986, completed by team silvers in 1974, 1975, 1979, and 1983. Domestically, he won national titles in 1973, 1975, 1978-80, 1982, 1986, and 1988.

Pusch then studied coaching at the Sports High School at Köln (Cologne) and became a very successful coach at Tauberbischofsheim, notably spotting the talent of Anja Fichtel-Mauritz. In 1994 he was named West German chief épée coach. After the 2000 Sydney Olympics Pusch resigned due to heavy differences with coaching legend Emil Beck, and then became Regional Chief Coach at Tauberbischofsheim until 2012. Thereafter he founded a sport and event marketing company.

Pusch was inducted into the German Sports Hall of Fame in 2016 and was elected Fencer of the Century in 2001. He was also awarded the Silver Bay Leaf, Germany’s highest sports award. He became an avid golf player with a handicap of 5.8.