News15 Oct 2022


1960 Olympic shot put champion Nieder dies

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US shot putter Bill Nieder

World Athletics is deeply saddened to hear that US shot putter Bill Nieder died on 7 October at the age of 89.

Along with winning Olympic gold in 1960 and bronze in 1956, Nieder set three world records in his career and was the first man to throw beyond 20 metres.

Born in New York in 1933, Nieder grew up in Lawrence, Kansas, and it was there where he discovered his gift for the shot. In high school, he became the first ‘prep’ athlete to throw beyond 60 feet (18.29m) with the 12-pound (5.44kg) shot put.

He continued to break barriers during his time at the University of Kansas, becoming the first collegiate athlete to throw beyond 60 feet with the standard senior weight shot.

In 1956, at the age of 22, Nieder finished third at the US Olympic Trials, qualifying for the Melbourne Games later that year. He went on to earn the silver medal at the Olympics. In 1957 he set a PB of 18.94m, which stood as the world-leading mark that year, and won the US Championships with a meeting record of 18.76m.

Nieder competed in a golden era for US shot putting and regularly competed against legendary throwers Parry O’Brien and Dallas Long. O’Brien was the dominant thrower throughout the 1950s, while Long excelled during the early 1960s. Nieder, meanwhile, reached his peak in 1960 and started that season with a world record of 19.45m, breaking Long’s mark of 19.38m that had been set just two weeks prior.

Long responded one week later with an improvement on the world record, 19.67m, but Nieder hit back in April with a world record of 19.99m.

Nieder went on to win most of his competitions that season, regularly throwing beyond 19 metres, but he picked up a leg injury before the US Olympic Trials and wound up in fourth place, outside the automatic qualifying spots.

Once recovered from his injury, Nieder vented his frustrations by breaking the world record a third time that year. His 20.06m throw in Walnut, California, on 12 August was the first 20-metre throw in the history of shot putting.

Nieder travelled to Rome as a reserve for USA’s Olympic team. Dave Davis, who had finished third at the Olympic Trials, picked up an injury just before the competition began, opening up a place for Nieder.

Once there and after breezing through qualifying, Nieder made no mistakes in the final and opened his series with an Olympic record of 18.67m. O’Brien, the defending champion, responded with 18.77m to take the lead, and then increased it to 19.11m in round two. But Nieder came back in round five with another big improvement on the Games record, throwing 19.68m to secure the gold medal.

Nieder retired from competitive athletics at the end of the 1960 season. Following a brief foray into boxing, he worked for 3M and was instrumental in developing artificial surfaces for track and field. He sold the first ever synthetic track surface for an Olympic Games to the organisers of the 1968 Olympics.

 

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