Ivan Poddubny


Ivan Maximovich Poddubny was a Zaporozhian Cossack-born professional wrestler from the Russian Empire and later the Soviet Union. He began his sports career around 1900; his career lasted for about forty years and he lost only two times.

Biography

Piddubniy was born on John the Apostle day in 1871 into a family of Zaporozhian Cossacks in the village of Krasenivka, in the Zolotonosha county of the Poltava Governorate of the Russian Empire. Having a big family Piddubny senior had a difficult time to provide for his big family, therefore Ivan was forced to leave his father's house before turning 20. As a young man, Piddubny worked as a fitter in the ports of Sevastopol and Feodosiya for seven years earning a nickname of Ivan the Great. In Feodosiya, Ivan started to practice with kettlebells and participated in some wrestling fights. Sometime around 1897-1898, he started traveling with circus tours and performed at first in Sevastopol and later in Kiev arenas.
Sometime in 1903, Piddubny joined the Saint Petersburg Athletic Club with which he participated in World Championships in Moscow and Paris. In 1905 he became the World Champion in wrestling in Paris and later toured Italy, Algeria, Belgium, Berlin, winning a championship in Nice. In 1906, Piddubny won two more World Cups in Paris and Milan. Before returning to his home in Krasenivka in 1910, he also won several more world cups in Vienna, Paris, and Frankfurt.
Ivan repeatedly won Greco-Roman wrestling "World Cups" among professionals, including the most authoritative of them – in Paris. In 1925–27 he performed in Germany and US.
According to the Krasenivka museum, he did not waste his money earned during fights and upon his return home bought of land, two houses in a neighboring Bohodukhivka village, a small store, a churn shop, two mills one of which was located in Orzhytsia. Around that time, he got married for the first time. Sometime in 1913, Piddubny participated in another World Cup in Moscow where he became a runner-up. It was then that his wife left him for another taking his gold medals.
While touring in Rostov, Ivan meets his future second wife whom he marries in 1923. In 1920s he was touring the United States staying undefeated while visiting New York City, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Chicago, San Francisco. During his tour in the United States he was forced to fight freestyle as his opponents. At age 56 Ivan won a beauty contest among men in the United States. Being unable to take out his earned half a million dollars from the bank, he left for home.
Later Ivan continued to perform in the Russian circuses retiring finally at age of 70. His last farewell performance he did in the Tula city circus in 1941. After his retirement, he with his wife settled in Kuban buying a two-storey house with a garden in Yeysk.
In November 1939, he was given the title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR, and in 1945 that of Honored Master of Sports.
During the Nazi German occupation, he refused to leave the Soviet Union to train German wrestlers.
Piddubny maintained a lifelong professional rivalry with wrestler Stanislaus Zbyszko. He died undefeated on 8 August 1949, in the town of Yeysk, in the Kuban region in Southern Russia from a heart attack. Ivan was buried in Yeysk in a park outside of the city. At his burial site was installed an obelisk that used to say "Here lies the Russian bogatyr".

Personal life

His first wife, Antonina, cheated on him and ran away with another, stealing his gold medals. Antonina later regretted her actions and attempted to return, but Ivan would not forgive her.
According to the director of the Krasenivka museum, Ivan had three sisters and three brothers. The fate of Omelyan and Mykyta is unknown, while Mytrofan continued to live in Krasenivka where he died in 1966. The last relative of Ivan Piddubny who lived in Krasenivka was his granddaughter Hanna Zakharivna who died sometime before 2011. It is also known that both Motrona and Maryna had three children each, yet the most close relations Ivan kept with his youngest sister Yevdokiya and was as godfather of her daughter Mariya. Eventually, Yevdokiya moved to the neighboring village of Bohodukhivka and later to Zolotonosha.
Ivan's father name was Maksym Ivanovych Piddubny. According to the Krasenivka museum, Ivan Piddubny's height was, his weight was, his biceps girth was, and his neck was thick.
Among Ivan Piddubny's friends was Dmytro Yavornytsky who lived in Dnipropetrovsk.

Championships, accomplishments and awards

There is a monument dedicated to Ivan Piddubny in his home village of Krasenivka. There is also the Ivan Piddubny Fund headed by Petro Dusheiko. The Fund sponsors the annual festival of bogatyr strength which is conducted since 1998. The festival which gathers up to 10,000 people was visited once by a grandson and great grandson of Ivan Piddubny who arrived from Kazakhstan.