Advance of athletics in USSR Sports societies train millions of youngsters In the Soviet Union today, light athletics is one of the most popular branches of sport. Like football it has many millions of fans many not so young —’take part in it. The sport is mainly organize at factories, farms, colleges, etc. These societies each cover a wide variety of sports, with special sec- tions for groups with particular interests. Training usually takes place at the many stadiums and sports grounds, owned by the societies and factories, the schools and in- stitutes. Subscriptions to the sports so- cieties are negligible. And mem- bership carries with it the right to use all the facilities of the club. These facilities, incidentally cover all the necessary sporting equipment, as well as the actual use of the track, grounds, etc. ¥ It also covers the provision of first-class tuition. In the Soviet Union today, there are over 2,000 of these well appointed sports stadiums and more than 30,000 sports grounds with facilities for light athletics. The USSR’s biggest stadium equipped for light athletics, is in Leningrad. It seats over 100,000. The Moscow Dynamo stadium seats 80,000. Other major stadiums are to be found throughout the coun- try. Some of the biggest of them are in such places as the port of Odessa on the Black Sea, Tbilisi, in Georgia; Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, Sverdlovsk, engineer- ing town in the Urals; Yerevan in Amenia; Minsk in Byelorussia. Many of the big factories have their own stadiums and sports grounds, which are of the high- est standard. Among excellent ones are those at the Trekhgornaya Works, the Kauchuk plant, the Krasnaya Zarya in Leningrad and Uralmash in Sverdlovsk. Among the sports societies fore- most in light athletics are Nauka —which takes in scientific work- ers and most students; Pischevik, covering’ workers in the food in- dustries; Iskra, embracing civil servants; and the Shakhtyor so- ciety, which covers the miners. These sports societies, like many others, are trade union societies, closely associated with their parent bodies. They have their branches in towns and cities all over'the coun- try. And they run local and na- tional contests in which hundreds of thousands take part. The following figures will give you some idea of the mass charac- ter of light athletics in the USSR. Each year, the sports societies organize, spring and autumn in- ter-town contests, conducted by correspondence. Last year no less than 600,000 took part in these contests. And 200,000 of those competing were women. A careful system of sports cate- gories, indicating the standard reached by the individual, ‘is ap- plied throughout Soviet sport. The societies include in their ranks more than half a million athletes who have reached these standards, and who take part regu- larly in athletics meetings. The standards are not easy to! and millions of young people — and d through the large number of sports societies and clubs A sports demonstration on Red Square in Moscow. achieve. Already high, they were raised again last year, owing to the general improvement in the level. The lowest (third) category in the men’s 100 metres, for instance, necessitates doing the distance un- der test conditions in 12.3 sec. For the men’s 400 metres the times allowed is 55 sec. ; For the high jump, the candi- date must clear 160 cm. (about 5 ft. Russian distance runner Vladi- mir Kuc, who finished a step be-’ hind England’s Chris Chataway in London, shattered Chataway’s record for the 5,000 metres just 10 days later in Vienna. Kuc (above) is improving steadily and is expected to compete in the 1956 Olympics. 3 in.); for the pole vault it is 3.20 metres (10 ft. 6 in.); for the shot- put 11.50 m. (87 ft. 854 in.). And to gain the category, can- didates must reach the standard set in ALL fields of athletics, not just one! There are parallel systems of categories (four) for women ath- letes, and for youngsters under 18. Many hundreds of fulltime coaches and trainers ensure that the athletes make the best use of the facilities available. They receive their training in the 13 physical culture colleges and 37 other special sports schools. Apart from these full-time coaches, a very important part is played by amateur trainers—tens of thousands of them. These volunteers are all sports- men who have achieved high cate- gories. They get special training for the job in spare-time sports schools—and, of course, all this training is free. At their factories and offices— as spare time work—they help their mates to learn the technique of jumping, running, etc., and gen- erally supervise the training. They are a great help in smaller places where facilities are relative- ly limited, while, in the bigger places, they are grand assistants to the full-time coaches and train- ers. There are many special sports ‘schools for young people, main- tained under the supervision of the local department of education. These schools train their students to pass the category tests at all levels. These schools provide courses for leisure hours—and their task is to turn the more talented young- sters into first-class sportsmen. All their courses are free. Gert Whyte's SPOR EASON’S greetings to all read- ers of this column — sports and sports fans, knockers and boosters, weight lifters and ballet dancers, yes, and wrestlers too. * * * Maurice (Rocket) Richard scor- ed the 400th goal of his National Hockey League career last Sat- urday night. It was also his 16th of the season. Here’s his lifetime record, unequalled in the annals of the ice game: ‘Games Goals Se eee 16 5 5 sae 46 32 abe 50 50 Sess 59 27 Oe eee 60 45 - SE ee 53 28 ae 59 20 Eas. 70. = « 448 See Ar iis 65 42 48 27 70 28 70 37 The Rocket’s 50 goals in the 1944-45 season set a league record which is likely to stand for some time. On the famous old “Punch Line” with him were Toe Blake and Elmer Lach. x * n British soccer has really come back into its own. After the Wolves did “a Spartak” on the Hungarians, Chelsea held Red Banner to a 2-2 draw: Before the Honved and Red Banner left London on their way home, a Hungarian football of- ficial said: “We have enjoved our visit immensely and shall look forward to further games against British sides.” He vaid tribute to the hospi- tality which the teams had re- ceived both in Scotland and Eng- land. * * x Jack Solomons, London boxing TLIGHT promoter, is flying to Buenos Aires to negotiate with Pascual Perez to defend his fiyweight championship against the winner of the Dai Dower vs. Eric Mars- den fight which is.to take place in London on February 8. Then he will visit New York with an offer to Rocky Marciano, the heavyweight champ, to meet Don Cockell. * * x A Reuters dispatch says the Soviet Union has told the organ- izing committee of the 1955 ice- hockey championships in Krefeld, Germany that it will send a team to defend the title. The championships will be heid from February 25 to March 6, and the USSR and Canada are favor ites to meet in the final. During January teams from sev eral countries will play exhibition games in Moscow. Too‘bad Cana dian’amateur hockey moguls turn- ed down aniinvitation to send a team. x x x Another honor for Marilyn Bell. The U.S. maguzine Mademoiselle, which announces 10 ‘merit awards” every January to voung women “who have already dis- tinguished themselves in their fields and are expected to achieve even greater honors,” -included Marilyn in the 1955 list, with this comment: : ; “Marilyn Bell of Toronto, swim- mer. This 16-year-old high school student dived almost unnoticed into ‘Lake Ontario last fall with ~ all eves and publicity on Florence Chadwick. Tagging along ‘for the honor of Canada, ’and after a 21-hour battle against eight-foot waves, icy waters and her own exhaustion, she emerged the only person ever to swim Lake On- tario.” Canada’s sweetheart, Marilyn Bell of Toronto, swam Lake Ontario last summer to become this country’s athlete of the vear. Photo above shows her appearing before an outdoor audience of 20,000 at Islington, Ontario, to accept an illuminated scroll and to hear the announcement of a new orthopedic ward for crippled children named in her honor. PACIFIC TRIBUNE — DECEMBER 24, 1954 — PAGE 11