Athletics at the 1952 Summer Olympics – Men's shot put

Men's shot put at the Games of the XV Olympiad
Venue	Helsinki Olympic Stadium
Dates	21 July (qualifying and final)
Medalists
Parry O'Brien United States   Darrow Hooper United States   Jim Fuchs United States

Athletics at the 1952 Summer Olympics
Track events
100 m		men		women
200 m		men		women
400 m		men
800 m		men
1500 m		men
5000 m		men
10,000 m		men
80 m hurdles				women
110 m hurdles		men
400 m hurdles		men
3000 m steeplechase		men
4×100 m relay		men		women
4×400 m relay		men
Road events
Marathon		men
10 km walk		men
50 km walk		men
Field events
Long jump		men		women
Triple jump		men
High jump		men		women
Pole vault		men
Shot put		men		women
Discus throw		men		women
Javelin throw		men		women
Hammer throw		men
Combined events
Decathlon		men

The men's shot put event was part of the track and field athletics programme at the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finland. The competition was held on 21 July at Helsinki Olympic Stadium. The finals were swept by the United States, with Americans Parry O'Brien taking the gold medal, Darrow Hooper earning silver and Jim Fuchs receiving his second consecutive bronze medal in the event.

While recuperating from surgery to deal with a knee injury, Fuchs developed a technique he called "the sideways glide" which enabled him to compete without pain and gain greater distance on his tosses. Fuchs, who was the world record holder at the time of the games, was nursing a pulled ligament in his right hand, which interfered with his ability to compete.^[1] In the years after his bronze medal performance at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London, Fuchs was the best shot putter in the world, winning 88 consecutive meets and setting four world records in a stretch of 14 months.^[2]

Using a technique that became known as the "O'Brien glide", Parry O'Brien broke Fuchs's consecutive meet winning streak and started a streak of his own that ran from July 1952 to June 1956 in which he won 116 consecutive meets and set 17 world records, in addition to becoming the first person to break through the distances of 18 meters, 60 feet and 19 meters.^[3] Parry would go on to repeat his gold medal performance at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne and win a silver medal at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, before falling just out of the medals in the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.^[4]

Hooper beat both O'Brien and Fuchs in the 1952 Final Trials with a throw of 17.41m (57–1⅝), a distance that would have won him a gold medal if he had been able to repeat it in Helsinki.^[5] In the first round of the final O'Brien reached a distance of 17.41 (57–1½), which gave him the lead, holding on until the final round when Hooper's 17.39 (57–0¾) put him just two centimeters short of a gold medal.^[6]

Results

Qualifying round

Qualification: Qualifying Performance 14.60 (Q) advance to the Final.

Rank	Athlete	Nationality	Result	Notes
1	Parry O'Brien	United States	16.05
2	Oto Grigalka	Soviet Union	15.90
3	Roland Nilsson	Sweden	15.81
4	Darrow Hooper	United States	15.48
5	Jim Fuchs	United States	15.29
5	Jiří Skobla	Czechoslovakia	15.29
7	Georgy Fyodorov	Soviet Union	15.16
8	Per Stavem	Norway	15.12
9	Alois Schwabl	Austria	15.00
10	Angiolo Profeti	Italy	14.93
11	Tadeusz Krzyżanowski	Poland	14.90
12	John Savidge	Great Britain	14.89
13	Lucien Guillier	France	14.62
14	Aapo Perko	Finland	14.50
15	Toivo Telen	Finland	14.30
16	Ramón Rosario	Puerto Rico	14.21
17	Kaarto Rask	Finland	14.08
18	Konstantinos Giataganas	Greece	14.05
19	John Giles	Great Britain	13.73
20	Nuri Turan	Turkey	13.00

WR world record | AR area record | CR championship record | GR games record | NR national record | OR Olympic record | PB personal best | SB season best | WL world leading (in a given season)

DNF = did not finish | DNS = did not start | DQ = disqualification | NM = no mark (i.e. no valid result) | Q = qualification by place in heat | q = qualification by overall place

Final

Rank	Athlete	Nationality	1	2	3	4	5	6	Result	Notes
	Parry O'Brien[4]	United States	17.41	17.21	16.79	16.87	17.12	16.53	17.41	OR
	Darrow Hooper[5]	United States	17.02	16.59	17.08	16.90	16.93	17.39	17.39
	Jim Fuchs[7]	United States	16.93	x	x	x	17.06	x	17.06
4	Oto Grigalka	Soviet Union	16.53	16.78	15.91	16.27	16.29	16.33	16.78
5	Roland Nilsson	Sweden	16.55	16.08	16.33	x	x	x	16.55
6	John Savidge	Great Britain	16.17	16.18	x	16.19	16.03	x	16.19
7	Georgy Fyodorov	Soviet Union	15.98	16.01	16.06				16.06
8	Per Stavem	Norway	15.14	16.02	15.31				16.02
9	Jiří Skobla	Czechoslovakia	15.73	15.60	15.92				15.92
10	Tadeusz Krzyżanowski	Poland	15.08	14.57	14.32				15.08
11	Lucien Guillier	France	13.94	14.46	14.84				14.84
12	Angiolo Profeti	Italy	14.59	14.00	14.74				14.74
13	Alois Schwabl	Austria	14.43	14.20	14.45				14.45

Key: OR = Olympic record

References

1. Danzig, Allison. "4 Olympic Titles Won By U. S.; Soviet Leads; United States Takes Four Track and Field Tests Before 55,000 at Olympics REMIGINO WINS 100 IN BLANKET FINISH At the Olympics: A Photo Finish, a Grand-Slam Presentation and a Pole Vault Qualifier", The New York Times, 22 July 1952. Accessed 19 October 2010.
2. Douglas, Martin. "James E. Fuchs, Shot-Put Innovator, Dies at 82", The New York Times, 17 October 2010. Accessed 18 October 2010
3. Elliott, Helene. "Parry O'Brien, 75; champion revolutionized shotput throw", Los Angeles Times, 23 April 2007. Accessed 19 October 2010.
4. Parry O'Brien, Sports-Reference.com. Accessed 19 October 2010.
5. Darrow Hooper, Sports-Reference.com. Accessed 19 October 2010.
6. Athletics at the 1952 Helsinki Summer Games: Men's Shot Put, SportsReference.com. Accessed 19 October 2010.
7. Jim Fuchs, Sports-Reference.com. Accessed 19 October 2010.