SPORTS
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The first sports associations in Romania were established in the mid-19th century.
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Two years later the Federation of the Sports Societies of Romania was set up in the capital,
being followed by the Romanian Olympic Committee in 1914.
The first higher education institution in this domain,
the National Institute for Physical Education, opened its gates in 1923.
In the period between the two World Wars Romanian sportsmen registered the first victories international contests.
The first Olympic medal, a bronze one, was won in Paris in 1924 by the rugby team; it was followed by a silver medal at horse racing at the Berlin Olympiad (1936). The first world champion titles were won in 1934 and 1936 (at luge), while at boxing Romania obtained the first European title in 1930 through Lucian Popescu.
After World War II, during the communist regime sport was considered "a state issue of national interest"
and its mission, the same as in the other East European states,
was to increase the prestige not only of the country but also of the regime on the world scene.
In terms of material infrastructure, that attitude was of great benefit.
Significant investment was made in sports centres, supplies and equipment;
two sports hours per week were compulsory during the entire school cycle
and schools with intensive sports training were opened.
Stadiums, sports grounds and sports halls were built in the large cities,
but not too many swimming pools and skating einks. Mass sports were encouraged.
On the other hand, that was accompanied by a careful control and co-ordination of performance sports.
Romanian sportsmen always perfored as amateurs, the professional status was never accepted by the authorities.
A "National Committee", later on renamed "Union", then "National Council for Physical Education and Sports",
with the status of Ministry, co-ordinated all the sports activities on a nation-wide scale.
Over the past half of century football has remained the most popular sport.
Other disciplines were more or less popular according to the international successes scored in international contests.
In the 1950s women's table tennis, target shooting, boxing, wrestling and weight lifting scored the first notable successes. At the Helsinki Olympic Games (1952), Iosif Sarbu brought Romanian the first gold medal (at target shooting). In the 1960s and 1970s, women's athletics saw a period of boom. Between 1957 and 1961 Iolanda Balas improved the world high jump record 14 times and won the gold medals at this event at the Olympic Games of 1960 and 1964. The Romanian rowing and canoe - kayak were imposed by representatives of exception who have created real schools which have kept this Romanian sport at the top of world standings to date. Canoeist Ivan Patzaichin, a Danube Delta native, was four times Olympic champion (Mexico City - 1968, Munich - 1972, Moscow - 1980 and Los Angeles - 1984) and won seven times the Olympic and world title between 1970 and 1983. Through Ion Tiriac and Ilie Nastase (the latter being the winner of the FILT Grand Prix in 1972 and 1973) Romanian participated three times in the Davis Cup final, however without managing to win it. Thanks to these two great sportsmen, tennis is very popular among the Romanians. Out of the team-based sports enjoying a good tradition in Romania, handball, first women's handball, then men's handball, offered an opportunity to both national teams and club teams to repeatedly mount the highest step of the European, world and Olympic podium. 1976 was the year which brought celebrity to the Romanian women's gymnastics school, Romania's women gymnasts having maintained themselves in the world edite to date. At the Olympic Games in Montreal in 1976 Nadia Comaneci won three gold medals, one silver and one bronze medal.
After the collapes of the communist regime in December 1989, Romanian sports, too, entered a period of transition. The state's involvement has dramatically diminished and so have the financing sources. And yet the dynamism of the 45 specialised federations, the efforts of the Clubs which in their turn were being restructured, caused Romania, with a total 18 and 20 medals, respectively, at the latest two Olympic Games - Barcelona (1992) and Atlanta (1996) - to occupy the same praiseworty 14 th position (with four gold medals at either Olympiad). In recent years notable results have been registered by women's gymnastics, rowing, boxing (Mihai Leu won a professional world champion belt) and, naturally, football, Romanian having been a remarkable participant in the last three World Cup editions. Winter sports, swimming and cycling have instead been a sort of Cinderella. Athough there is a traditional Romanian sport, oina (coming closer to baseball), this sport has never been popular either with sportsmen or with spectators.
Romanian Olympic Medalists and a list of other pages about Romanian sport.
| Last update: 2000, Septembrie 27 | |||||||||
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