Iosif Sîrbu

Iosif Sîrbu

Personal information
Born	(1925-09-25)25 September 1925 Şibot, Romania
Died	Bucharest, Romania
Sport
Sport	Sports shooting
Medal record Men's shooting Representing Romania Olympic Games 1952 Helsinki 50 metre rifle prone

Iosif Sârbu (25 September 1925 – c. 6 September 1964) was a Romanian sports shooter and Romania’s first ever Olympic champion.

Sporting career

He was born in Șibot, Alba County, Romania. His family moved to the Romanian capital of Bucharest when Iosif was 7 years old. His father, Dănilă Sârbu, soon got a job at the Tunari Sports Shooting Range, whose manager he became just after World War II. This provided an opportunity for young Iosif to take up sports shooting in 1937,at the age of 12. He won his first national level competition (Bucharest Cup) in 1939.

In the first national championship after the war (1946) he became Romanian champion in the Free Rifle, Standing event, scoring 358 points. His first international victory came in the Balkan championships in Belgrade (1948) where he won the Free Rifle, Prone event.

In the 1952 World Championships in Oslo, Norway, he won medals in all 4 events he participated in (2 gold and 2 silver medals). Shortly afterwards, in the 1952 Summer Olympic Games in Helsinki, he wins the Small-bore Rifle 50 metres, Prone event, scoring an absolute world and Olympic record of 400 points. This means he scored a maximum 10 points at every shot(there were 40 shots in total). The same was achieved by Soviet Boris Andreyev. However, according to the regulations in force at the time, Sârbu was awarded the gold medal, on grounds of his hitting the very center of the target 33 times, compared to Andreyev’s 28. The very center is in fact a small dot inside the 10-point area. Arthur C. Jackson of the U. S. took bronze with 398 points. Sârbu thus became Romania’s first Olympic champion in history, regardless of discipline.

Despite his declining eyesight, Iosif Sârbu took part in another two Olympics, finishing 5th in Melbourne, 1956 and 12th in Rome, 1960. He showed a tremendous bravery by switching to his left eye after the 1952 Olympics as the right eye, his aiming eye since childhood, was severely affected by the declining eyesight.

On 6 September 1964 he was found dead in his Bucharest home. The circumstances of his death were never officially explained or confirmed, but it is widely believed that he committed suicide, after a medical verdict not only denied him participation in the 1964 Olympic games in Tokyo, but stated he would never be able to compete again, because of his eye condition.

Legacy

He is the first Romanian Olympic gold medalist and world record holder ever, in any discipline. The main sports shooting complex in Bucharest is named after him.

Quotes

“In the big concert of sports, shooting is like (…) a sonata for solo violin. Everything is clear and forceful. And the shooter is alone. Alone with himself. Soccer’s trumpets are left far behind, beyond the wall of adolescence. In shooting, everything is serious and profound…”(from Iosif Sârbu’s essay, “The Olympics of the Year 2000”, 1960)

Notes

Ioan Chirilă,Decatlonul de aur, Editura Stadion, București,1962 (includes Iosif Sârbu’s essay quoted above) Horia Alexandrescu, Aur olimpic românesc, Editura Sport-Turism, București, 1979

External links

• Helsinki 1952 shooting Olympic medalists on the IOC website
• a short biography of Iosif Sârbu (in Romanian)