Gogi Murmanovich Koguashvili today is the head coach of the Russian Greco-Roman wrestling team. At one time, he was one of the best wrestlers in the world in the categories of 90 and 97 kg, five times became the champion of the planet, regularly won continental championships. He has a significant achievement - participation in four Olympics, at one of which he became a bronze medalist.
Kutaisi “Torpedo” fan
Gogi Koguashvili, whose biography will be told in our article, was born in Georgia, in the Tskhaltubo district in 1969. In the third grade, he took up the Greco-Roman wrestling, and he worked selflessly, voluntarily jogging and swinging on the horizontal bars after training.
Soon Gogi Koguashvili began to live in Kutaisi, where he began to attract the attention of coaches of Georgian youth teams. Here, by the way, he became interested in football, constantly attended the matches of the Kutaisi “Torpedo”, who then played in the major league of the union championship. Gradually, he became one of the best young wrestlers of the USSR, began to participate in international junior tournaments.
The first victory came to him in 1987, when the athlete won the European Championship in Greco-Roman wrestling. Gogi Koguashvili shortly before that moved to Moscow, where he began to progress rapidly and grew into a strong fighter under the guidance of coach Jemal Nikolayevich Kostava.
At the junction of eras
In 1989, a wrestler from Kutaisi won the youth world championship, after which he became one of the closest candidates to the national team of the USSR. He regularly took medals in domestic tournaments, became the winner of the USSR, however, he was called up to the main team only in 1991 to participate in the World Cup.
Here he performed successfully, won the tournament and earned the right to represent the country at the Olympic Games in Barcelona.
In 1992, the USSR ordered a long life, and the combined team of the CIS republics took part in the main four-year tournament. However, this was not felt in any way in the team of wrestlers who continued to be a single team and did not divide each other into Russians and Georgians.
Gogi Koguashvili, who first came to the Olympics, came under tremendous psychological pressure and could not cope with his nerves in the first fight, where he lost to a Turkish wrestler. After the defeat, the Kutaisi athlete really got together and issued a brilliant winning streak, eventually winning a bronze medal.
Gogi's Hegemony
By 1993, Gogi Koguashvili had finally matured and no longer looked like a self-doubt boy, as he seemed at the 1992 Olympics. He won his first adult world championship, and in the final he completely defeated Barcelona's Olympic triumph Mike Bullman with a score of 6: 1.
A year later, at the European Championships in Greece, the athlete received a very serious injury, tearing the pectoralis major muscle. Gogi Koguashvili underwent a difficult operation, doctors put an end to his future career, but three months later he calmly stepped on the carpet and became the world champion, winning in the final against Vyacheslav Oleinik, who later became the Atlanta Olympic champion.
However, the insidious injury made itself felt at the most inopportune time. In 1995, the wrestler pulled his sore shoulder again, which made his preparation for the 1996 Olympic tournament crumpled, and he did not perform at full strength there. However, at the world championships he still had no equal. Since 1997, he began to perform in the category of up to 97 kg and won three titles in a row. Before the Games in Sydney, everyone was waiting for him to finally conquer the unattainable peak, but this time he injured his right shoulder and again remained below the prize winners.
Trainer
By 2004, Gogi Koguashvili continued to remain in the national team, while combining the responsibilities of one of the coaches. The Athens Olympics was the fourth for him and was to become his swan song. Gogi Koguashvili very powerfully started the tournament, for which he prepared especially carefully. He won against the current world champion Litberg, passed an uncomfortable opponent from Belarus Sergey Lishtvan.
However, the third fight turned out to be really unlucky for him, according to the results of the draw, his opponent constantly got the advantage, who as a result managed to get into the tournament finals.
Having completed an active sports career, Gogi Koguashvili naturally switched to coaching. Today he leads the Greco-Roman wrestling team.