Zygmunt Heljasz

Poland’s Zygmunt Heljasz started his sporting career as a boxer where he became the district heavyweight champion. By 1927 Heljasz had switched to track and field athletics and competed in the weight throwing events. From 1928 to 1935 he won 14 national titles across five disciplines with victory in the shot put (1928–34), two-handed shot put (1928–29), discus throw (1931–32, 1935), two-handed discus throw (1928), and the hammer throw (1931). He was also the AAA champion in England in the shot put in 1933 and 1934. Heljasz competed in the shot and discus at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, finishing 7th and 13th, respectively. Two years later he finished seventh in the shot put at the 1934 European Championships in Torino, Italy.

Heljasz was scheduled to compete at the 1936 Berlin Olympics but was excluded from participating due to a dispute with the Polish Athletic Federation, which resulting in him receiving a one-year ban. He then turned to coaching, initially working in Belgium in 1937, before returning to Poland. In World War II he was a prisoner in the Sachsenhausen and Gross-Rosen concentration camps. Heljasz survived to continue coaching athletics after the end of the war.

Personal Bests: SP – 16.05 (1932); DT – 47.09 (1934).