József Tarányi

József Tarányi amazed those around him with his immense strength when he was a young man, lifting 3-4 sacks of flour at a time with childlike ease and carrying them from one place to another. As an athlete he first tried his hand at weightlifting then switched to wrestling. He started competing at the age of 17 as a member of the MTE. In 1928 he moved to Debrecen and joined the wrestling department of DVSC. Tarányi competed mostly as a heavyweight and light-heavyweight, winning the national youth championship in 1929. He then won the gold medal in the adult Hungarian championship in the Greco-Roman in 1932 and 1946, and in freestyle in 1933 and 1934.

His first significant international achievement was in 1934 when he won the gold medal in the heavyweight category at the Workers’ Olympics. His greatest sporting success was at the 1948 London Olympics, where he came fifth in the heavyweight category in the Greco-Roman style. Tarányi competed in the light-heavyweight category in the freestyle category, where he was eliminated after the third round. After his death the city of Debrecen buried him in a ceremonial tomb, named a competition series after him, and later also named a street after him.