World Weightlifting's Exclusive Interview with Norbert Schemansky - 1997

 World Weightlifting 1998 Volume 1

LaPointe: What relationship do you have with weightlifting today?

Schemansky: I follow it. That’s about it. I was once told that “just because you were a great lifter doesn’t mean you’re a great coach.” Today I don’t really coach. That doesn’t mean I haven’t coached. We had a gym in Detroit, the Astro Club. We won the state championship so many times, I think it was ten, that they quit giving out the trophy. At one time, we had more guys pressing over 300 pounds than any other place in the US. It was a real international atmosphere. Guys came from Finland, Sweden and Australia just to lift in my club. Anyone who came through town with a respectable total wanted to lift at the Astro. It wasn’t a nice looking club like you see today for bodybuilding, but it had a real lifters’ feel to it. It was a lot like the York gym, without the holes in the floor. Anyone could stop by: professional wrestlers, boxers, track men. It was great. So yeah, I coached. We had a lot of good lifters in Detroit. 

LaPointe: We saw you in Atlanta, but do you visit other weightlifting events too?

Schemansky: I went to the Atlanta Olympics. There was some great lifting there, but not from here (the US team.) I follow the sport because I love it. But until my retirement two weeks ago I couldn’t run around the world going to events. It would have been fun, but you’ve also got to make a living. 

LaPointe: You have four Olympic medals. Which of them is the dearest?

Schemansky: Naturally, the gold one. I broke three world records at the same time during that Olympics. It doesn’t get much better than that. 

LaPointe: What was the best competition of your lift and what was the biggest disappointment during your career?

Schemansky: 1962. When I almost won the World Championships at 38 years old. That was when Vlasov had the double jerk. What was funny was the very next year, Foldi, one of the best lifters of all times, did the same thing and it didn’t count. When he walked off the platform he said “I’m not Vlasov.” I guess that competition in 1962 satisfied both questions. You decide if I defeated Vlasov. The judges said I didn’t. That’s what really counts, isn’t it? Another disappointment came at customs in Vienna, 1954. They aske “How much money have you got?” The answer, “Nothing.” They couldn’t believe it. Here I was, a gold medalist in weightlifting, a highly respected sport in Europe, and I really didn’t have a cent in my pocket. At the 1954 World Championships some European officials gave their lifter an envelope. I saw it was full of money. They did this at the public ceremony. It was a big deal. They didn’t try to keep it secret. In the US, guys like Hoffman and York Barbell helped out a lifter, but it certainly wasn’t public. It was understood that overseas you could lift and make money at it. Not in the US. You had to keep a job to live. Sports like lifting were a hobby that some of us did real well at. 

LaPointe: Who is, in your opinion, the brightest star in the history of weightlifting?

Schemansky: That could be a two part question. The lifters today are better than ever in history. Every year someone is breaking a new record. There are some lifters today who have not even reached their potential. Look at this new superheavy, Chemerkin. He’s great (after this interview Chemerkin would continue to get super-heavier) But he is going to get much better if he doesn’t have an injury. He’s a rising star. For all the rising stars some will truly become great, but it depends on where the help comes from…

Now former stars. Chuck Vinci for example. He’s on you don’t hear about any more and he was a double gold medalist. He was great. Another one was Baszanowski. The little guys don’t get enough credit. A perfect example is when I went into a European bar with Bradford in fifty-two. The guys there found out we were lifters, so they took bets on who would take the gold the next day. They all decided it would be Bradford, because he was the bigger guy. I think he weighed about 300 pounds and I was under two hundred at the time. I won the gold. 

Although I don’t think you should look at only the guys lifting career to impress me. There is life after lifting. Guys lose focus on the big picture. I was really impressed by Vardanian. Not only could he lift, but I think the guy could play the piano. He didn’t even look like a lifter. He was clearly on of the best of all time. A very impressive guy. 

LaPointe: What do you think of the recent developments in women’s lifting?

Schemansky: A pure joke, no offense to the ladies. Don’t go compromising weight classes for the sake of it. The classes were just changed a few years ago, now they changed them again. Really it’s a reduction of the sport. Look at swimming where guys get medals in any of a dozen events. Guys can get half a dozen medals in one Olympic Games. Then you have weightlifting where you can get only one. I’ve always felt that lifters should get one for each lift. I would have had maybe a dozen instead of just four. It’s nice that women are in, but don’t compromise the sport any further, in any way

LaPointe: How do you spend your time today?

Schemansky: I just retired, but until two weeks ago I was working. I had fun lifting but I was making up for the time lost while lifting. Financially, some of the lifting bums of today will regret later when they have empty pockets. 

LaPointe: What did (and does) weightlifting mean to you?

Schemansky: I would like to see it on the upswing in the US. I think about my interview with the Free Press. The reporter asked me why I lifted weights. I said “Some guys like to play golf, some guys are just nutty about their sport.” Of course the paper the next day claimed that Schemansky says “All golfers are nutty.” That’s not what I meant, but you get the idea. I was nutty about it and still follow it. 

LaPointe: How any members are there in your family? Do any of them lift weights?

Schemansky: No one really lifts weights. My son works out a little, but he was actually a track athlete. All three of my daughters were pretty good swimmers. Of course there wasn’t really women’s lifting then, so who knows what they would have done. Girls can be athletes now. 

LaPointe: What results do you expect in your bodyweight category (Superheavyweight) at the next Olympic Games?

Schemansky: That’s funny. I lifted at so many different bodyweights. By next year I won’t know what the weight classes are. About ten or twelve years ago I proposed a system with nine classes and an 11 pound (5 kilo) difference between them, starting at 123 (56kg). But it was ignored. World wide there are so many guys lifting, and doing a great job, you never know when a new guy might pop up. 

LaPointe: What is your advice to weightlifters of the future?

Schemansky: If someone can’t guarantee you a future income, forget lifting. That is, if you don’t have a job lined up, you are missing out on part of life and you may regret it in the future. If you can combine lifting into something that will help you make a living and a future, keep it up. Don’t become a lifting bum. If you can work and lift, that’s great. But, it’s hard to do that at today’s competitive level.