Xaxa's lost gold - The story of the pentathlon at the 1924 Olympics

By Barnabas Nagy

The Hungarian Elemer rejected him with the short comment, 'Too young. He Somfay - here in a can wait.', even though he was already a legend in the 1976 photograph - Italian theatre. He was the commander of an assault was the owner of platoon' and it was natural for him to lead his men into an unusual Olympic battle, motivating the soldiers with his own example. medal. As he felt he He made even the generals of the k.u.k. Army8 bow had been treated before his talent. Literally. During a parade an Austrian unjustly, one side of general commanded him to present a grenade throw. the silver medal he Altough they had a large target area the young officer had won in 1929 in had something else in mind. He triggered the grenade, the pentathlon was recited the ‘magic words' (twenty-one, twenty-two, gilded for him. twenty-three) and trew the grenade straight up in the airwith an incredible force. Never before threw so many Photo. Volker Kluge marshals, generals and officers themselves to the ground in fear. The grenade blew up in a height of i*o metres. Only first lieutant Somfay and his platoon remained still. The veterans trusted their commander's abilities, they knew that even the shrapnel would be harmless from that height."9

In pentathlon as a outsider

Somfay started competitive sport relatively late, at age 21 he joined MAC (Magyar Atnletikai Club). His trainer, ElemerSomfay, nicknamed 'Xaxa" and the most notable Ivan Vadas noticed his excellent all-round abilities Hungarian athlete in the 1920s, was born and got him into serious training. In the 1923 Goteborg in Budapest in 1898 then raised in Nagybecskerek, the games he placed second in the 4oo metres hurdles. hometown of Ferenc Kemeny. His natural talentfortrack In 1924 he became Hungarian champion in the 200 and field athletics was discovered as a child: and i*oo metres hurdles and . His greatest As a first grader in gymnasium1 he mas excellent success came in 192k when he won the silver medal in , and gymnastics. He mas in pentathlon and according to the contemporary capable 0/125 cm in high jum p mhich mas his omn Hungarian commentaries, onlyan administration error height at the time. In the later years due toAmbrozy's3 prevented him from being an Olympic champion. influence he became interested in and discus The 80 years old Somfay's recollection the events of throm too. After graduation he attended the military the 1924 Paris Olympic Games academy in Becsujhely. In World War I he served in an At the time I thought I mould compete in the either in assault brigade. His talents mere greatly utilized, he koo metres hurdles or in the triple jum p because triple mas the best grenade thromer in the mhole division. Unfortunately he mas not able to avoid the destiny of Barnabas Nagy torn in 1955 in Eger (Heves, Hungary), the first line soldiers. He got hospitalized mith severe ft graduated in 1979 from tie Faculty of Econmics of the Karl Marx nervous shock'. " Univ. in Budapest (now lorvinus Univ.). He works as a labour y market analyst in his hometown. He is a regular contributor in I the yearbook of the Hungarian Olympic Academy: Olympic And how did this "nervous shock”5 manifest itself? "The H Champion Twins (20m), 'im Thorpe and Paavo Nurmi - Fallen 19 years old First Lieutenant was proposed forthe highest in the War Against Professionalism (2013), Cponyms (2019). military decoration but his strict uncle, Aurel Stromfeld6 jump was my favourite. What are the chances, I got a Hungarian leaders did not protest officially foot injury. I felt a terrible pain in my left heel bone, it was periostitis. I was not able to use that foot for long jump Pentathlon was on the programme ofthe modern and triple jump and hurdles was out of question too. Olympics in 1906 and between 1912 and 192c*. From 1912 They started thinking how to save the situation. I was the fifth, last event changed from wrestling to 1500 an all-round athlete, very fast runner, excellent in long metres. On /"July 1921* all five events were held the same jump and discus and good in javelin. They said 'There is day. 30 athletes started the first event, the long jump. the pentathlon, lets register him for the pentathlon!' So I The American LeGendre won the event with a world was entered in pentathlon as a outsider. record of 7 metres 76.5 centimetres (with that result he After the first event, :he long jump was over, I felt that would have won the longjump competition on the next one should be equally good in all five events. When day but he was not entered), Somfay became 5th with 6.77 this American wonderboy, LeGendre surprised me metres and the champion ofthe last Olympics, Lehtonen with a 776 centimetres world record, I grew sad. I was finished 7th. The second event, javelin, was won by the sitting on the side ofthe sandpit and felt the pain in Finnish Leino with a result above 5^ metres, Somfay was my heel thinking why was I unable to jump 7.10 with 2nd with a personal best of 52.07. Lehtonen became 5th, my right10 foot? My first jump was 5 5 0 , I was not LeGendre 11“'. So after two events Leino and Somfay were able to lauch myself properly. The second jum p was in the lead with 7-7 points (summarized place numbers), somewhat above 6 metres and the third one was 6.77 the American Kaer had 8 , LeGendre and Lehtonen 12­ and valid. If I had more chances I could have reached 12. The situation was complicated by the fact that the 7 m. [...] Finnish livari Yrjola” who placed 3rd in javelin withdrew Next came the . I was an excellent runner, from the competition and his results were removed so able to get under 22.8. Unfortunately, the competitors LeGendre's and Lehtonen's points were changed to 11-11 were distributed randomly in the time trials. I ran while the points Somfay and Leino remained the same. against two slow rivals and I won with a huge lead, around 10 metres advantage. The loudspeaker told us that it was 22.8 seconds. Everybody thought that the Olympic champ onship could not be taken from me. (I was the fastest in 200 metres.) There were two events left but I was a quite good discus thrower and a good runner. In discus I finished second, LeGendre was fourth but the Finnish Lehtonen got up beside me. The 1500 metres was won by a Swedish athlete, Lehtonen was the second and I was the third. We added the points and I was the champion with 3 points. But in the dressing room they said that in the official records I had 23.it seconds for the 200 metres, the time ofthe second place in my time trial. There was a mistake and the French said that they could not change After the sem i-finals and finals ofthe 100 and t*oo Paris 1921*: in the the records. [...] The Vice-President of MAC'S track and metres the pentathlon continued with the 200 metres pentathlon 200 m field field division, Dr. Gyula Vangel wanted to file an event. The participants were distributed randomly into the official result official protest but Szilard Stankovits, the President of 10 heats with 3 athletes in each (there were 2 two person- for Somfay was 23.i1 the Hungarian Athletics Association expelled him off heats due to withdrawing athletes). Somfay was in the 6th seconds. His sup­ the field. Stankovits said that the second place was a series with the Czechoslovakian Svoboda and the Dutch porters including an world class result toe and there was no need to ruin the Keizer. Somfay won with a 10 metres lead, the official official timekeeper starting French-Hungarian friendship. times were: Somfay 23.4, Svoboda 24.o Keizer24.2. believed his actual Thus I became a silver medallist and not an Olympic The chief editor of the Hungarian daily sport news, Dr. time was faster at champion. The talks went on fora very long time that Gyula Vadas wrote: 22.8 but lost the the Hungarian leadership made a huge mistake, His time is 23.4 seconds which is simply not right. gold medal (the namely Szilard Stankovits, because in the end it was his Stankovits measured 23.0 and most of the tribune and photo shows him responsibility. If he as a member of the international the people on the field, Misangyi, Zuber and others in ). jury had fle d the protest, it certainly would have been 22.8-22.9. But it had to be accepted, they awarded Photo: BarnahasNagyAfthive accepted. I, myself in my soul and my heart consider 6 points to him while Unger (22.8) got 1, Lehtonen, myself a gold medallist Olympic champion and such LeGendre, Kaer (23) got 2 -2 and Leino (23.2) got 5 with an unquestionable lead." points.” "Somfai..! Somfai..! Lehtonen won the discus with 40.44 metres before Somfairan the Somfay (37.76 m). LeGendre was the 4th, Leino placed headline of the 8th and Kaer 10th. The standing after the fourth event Budapest newspaper was: 1. Lehtonen 14 points, 2. Somfay 15 points, 3. Nemzeti Sport of 8 1" LeGendre 16 points, 4- Kaerig points, 5. Leino 20 points, July 1921*- Somfay's 6-7. Lahtinen and Unger 23-23. In the Official Report: name at birth was 1. Lehtonen 13 points, 2. Somfay 14 points, 3. LeGendre 15 "Stromfeld". But his points, 4. Kaeri8 points, 5. _einoi9 points, 6. Lahtinen father, a socialist 22 points, 8. Unger 30 points. According to the rules the writer, adopted the first six athletes should have ran in the 1500 metres name "Somfai" in but they had seven competitors because of the point the epoch ofmagya- equality. risation before the It was obvious that only the first three had a chance First World War. for the gold. In case of point equality the decathlon Somfay was allowed point table decided. So Somfay should have finished at to use an 'y' as a least one place before LeGendre and two places before privilege for his Lehtonen. Olympic achievement. Unger won the 1500 metres with a big lead but as it is discussed above, after the competition his result was Illustration: Barnabas Nagy Archive deleted. Dr. Gyula Vadasgave the following report: Behind Unger there was a huge competition for the second place: at 500 metres Lehtonen was before LeGendre and Somfay came after them. In the next lap So the private measurements of the Hungarian team's Somfay took the lead, he was the first of the three at leaders (among them Szilard Stankovits) showed that woo metres. At woo the fn ish started, first LeGendre Somfay finished between 22.8 and 23.0 seconds. Based broke out, he had to take the risk. Somfay did not let on that, he was supposed to geti or 2 points but instead him leave, followed him closely. For almost a hundred he was awarded with 6. Nonetheless the Hungariar metres the American kept his advantage but then he leaders did not protest officially, Stankovits prevented had to bow before Xaxa. For a moment our heart was them to file an official complaint. It shows the lack of shaking: the order was Somfay, LeGendre, Lehtonen. If precision and consistency in the measurements that it had lasted we would have won the Olympics! But it thewinningzoo metres'time of the Swedish Ungerwas was not over yet, the Finn left LeGendre standing with changed from 22.8 to 23.8 after all the events were done. a magnificent and then after a short struggle So there was actually a way to modify the results!1" he took over Somfay too and earned the second In the Official Report Unger had 8 points instead of 1 place with confidence. (Unger: W-U6.2, Lehtonen 4:47, and with this result he would not have qualified for the Somfay: k'-kB.2, LeGendre 4:52.6).^ final event, theisoo metres which he actually won. So in the report Somfay got a points more than his mair The official result of the 1500 metres: 1. Lehtonen, rivals. 2. Somfay, 3. LeGendre. The result of the entire After the first three events the best 12 athletes pentathlon competition was: 1. Lehtonen ia points, continued the competition. The placement points in 2. Somfay 16 points, 3. LeGerdre 18 points. the first three events were recalculated including only The next day fellow American William DeHart the remaining 12 competitors. The points of the top Hubbard jumped 7.445 metres, 32 centim etre less five were affected mainly by the step-down of Yrjola. than LeGendre's world record and won the long jump If the Finnish athlete had not given up tne competition becoming the first black athlete to win an Olympic after the , he most certainly would have gold medal in an individual competition. In 1925 qualified for the top 12 with any place less than the 25th Hubbard claimed the world record too with a jump of in the 200 metres. His place in javelin throw would 7.89 metres. So regarding the pentathlon races it can be have increased the lead of Somfay against Lehtonen argued that Lehtonen won a well deserved gold medal with one more point. while Somfay and LeGendre lost one. The standing was: 1. Kaer 9 points, 2-3. LeGendre According to the 80 years old Somfay17 he got the news and Leino 12-12 points, 4-5. Lehtonen and Somfay 13­ in the dressing room after t ie 1500 metres that official 13 points. In the Official Report there is 1 point less for records put him to the 6,t‘ place instead of the first everyone because of Unger's degradation. And also thus stripping him from his championship. In another Unger's 1500 metres result is not included. interview18 which also took place more than 50 years TABLEAU DES RESULTATS PENTATLON '6

L o n g ju m p Ja v e lin 200 n A fter 3 Modi-'ied places D iscus 1500 m Total

PI. Nam e Result PI. Result PI. Result 3I. P ts. ? l. 1. 2. 3- Pts. Result.PI. Pts. Result PI. Pts.

i. Lehtonen 668 7 50,93 5 23.O 1 13 4 7 4 1 12 4 0 ,4 4 1 13 4:47.0 1 14 2. So m fay 677 5 52,07 2 23.4 5 12 3 5 2 5 12 37,76 2 14 4:48.4 2 16

3. LeGendre 776,5 1 4 6 ,0 4 11 23.O 1 13 4 1 9 1 11 36,76 4 15 4 :52.6 3 18 4 . Leino 672 6 54,12 1 23.2 4 11 2 6 1 4 11 33,62 8 19 4 :5 5 .4 4 23 5 . Kaer 696 2 50,2 6 23.O 1 9 1 2 5 1 8 32,70 10 18 5:38.6 6 24

6. Lahtinen 6 8 9 ,5 3 48,66 9 23.6 7 19 6 3 7 7 17 36,08 5 22 4 :5 5 .6 5 27

7. H am ilto n 683 4 48 ,9 6 8 24.4 18 30 8 4 6 11 21 37,70 3 24

8 . Unger 656 8 4 8 ,4 5 10 23.8 8 26 7 8 8 8 24 35.11 6 30

9. N ilsson 640 13 51.17 4 25.0 21 38 11 11 3 12 26 33,4 5 9 35 10. Mplster 620 19 47,91 12 24.2 15 46 12 12 10 10 32 34 ,6 9 7 39

11. D uigan 6 54 ,5 9 4 5,6 16 23.8 8 33 9 9 9 11 28 27,26 11 39 12. Argue 646 11 4 1,8 4 20 23.4 5 36 10 10 12 5 27 DNS

Slack 643 12 34,18 28 23.8 8 48 13 Courtejaire 629 16 47,58 13 24 -6 20 49 14

Contoli 599 23 42,98 18 2 3 8 8 49 14 Viel 592 25 4 2.58 19 23.8 8 52 16

M edecin 6 49 10 32,43 29 24.O 13 52 16 de Keijser 619 20 4 4 ,0 7 17 2 4 2 15 52 16

Ruth 638 14 36,78 26 24.2 15 55 19

Pighi 626 17 39 ,82 23 25.0 21 61 20 Elemer Somfay- Ueda 605 22 47,47 15 25.4 25 62 21 Hungary'sNo.lof B ucher 617 21 38 ,95 24 24.4 18 63 22 the 1920s in the vest Fasten 598 24 47,58 13 25.8 26 63 22 of the Magyar Spahic 632 15 31,00 30 25.0 21 66 24 Athletikai Club Svoboda 537 28 37,88 25 24.O 13 66 24 (MAC). Z in ner 588 26 40,15 22 2 5 2 24 72 26

Spark 529 30 41,19 21 27.0 28 79 27 Photo: Sports Museum Budapest B en ardis 534 ,5 29 35,58 27 26.2 27 83 28

Yrjola 1. H. 625 18 51,72 3 DNS DNF Zacharo p. 54 8 ,5 27 4 9 ,0 0 7 DNS DNF

after the events he recollected that Nemzeti Sport” Kaer(JSA)26, 7. Lehtcnen (Finland)29. The second day celebrated his victory with the front page leadline isovei .. Dr. Gyula Vadas wrote. "Somfai..! Somfai..! Somfai..! " 20 So the small Hungarian camp (journalists, team The paper on 8 th July in fact was released w th the leaders, coaches, athletes and supporters) were headline but just below it Somfay's second place is celebrating the second place and most of then (at reported.21 The coverage of the track and field events on least 1 he leaders of the the trucK and field team and the first two pages concludes: the journalists of the Nemzeti Sport) were aware of the We double-checked the calculations and alh ough rt competition's official standing even before the start of is a little painful that we did not win, still the smalI the 1500 metres. Hungarian camp is filled with pride when Elener, th2 "Xaxa " runs into our arms. His performance exceeded Later career and life all the expectations. Being second and seating LeGendre is not only a glorious deed but also The most Elener Somfay said tnat he die not regard the loss of beautyful gift to Hungary. Olympic gold in 1924. as a serious matter. He thought that The result of the pentathlon: 1. Eero Lehtonen (Finland) he would have more opportunities to win a title. As a 16 points, 2. Elemer Somfay (Hungary) 18,3. LeGendre geruine all-round athlete he usually entered eigh t (USA) 2, 9. Unger (Sweden) 2 , 5 • Leino (Finlard)25, 6. ter events in domestic competitions and usually won Elemer Somfay. most of them. He also won the 1925 AAA triple jump title Caricature by the w ell- in England. known Hungarian After 1924 the pentathlon was removed from the artist Bela Szepes Olympic programme. Even so he was still expected to win (1903-1986), who in medals in decathlon, triple jump and hurdles 1929 in Chamonix took atthe 1928 Games in Amsterdam, but a week before the part in the Winter Olympics he ruptured his Achilles tendon. 33 He said: Games as a cross­ I did not believe that my foot would recover. I decided country skier. Four to write a book about the training of the Hungarian years later he won the track and field athletes. It took three and a half silver medal in javelin months. in Amsterdam. During his recovery Somfay completed his book Track Illustration: Barnabas Nagy Archive and field athletics and its training. It eventually ran to 400 pages and was published in 1928-9: I showed the technique of each event including non- Olympic events like standing jumps and with pictures and wrote training plans for everyone of them. The training systems in it are now A new start in the outdated, today it is very different to my time. However modern pentathlon the descriptions of techniques and styles remain in 1932 in los Angeles: correct. Between 1929 and 7945 the work was used as a Somfay (2"“ row textbook by the College of Physical Education. “• centre) among the participants during At the time Somfay's injury was considered career Before Los Angeles he felt that he can not keep up with the fencing. In the ending in athletics but demonstrating great willpower. the best track and field athletes in the world any more, final standings he He won the Hungarian in 1929 and he switched to modern pentathlon.h As a military officier finished seventh. 1930 breaking the national record in the process. He ne was excellent in riding and fencing and he was a returned to the Olympic stage in 1932 in the Modern Photo: Official Report good sharpshooter. His physical ablities and willpower Los Angeles 19)2 Pentathlon. were legendary. He won the qualifying race in Hungary 3 rd he thought that he would be able to win a medal again. Unfortunately he had no practice in modern aentathlon competitions ard it showed when he fell with the horse and finished 20thout of 25 in riding. After that he performed well (4th in fencing, 6th in shooting, •211 in swimming and 10,h in cioss-country ), but altogether it was "only" enough for a 7,h place. Somfay spent 18 years as a top level athlete. His last competition was in September 937, the "Five nations' modern pentathlon competition"; he was 39 years old then. In 1941 he was appointed as a Colonel to be the head of SPOTI, the sport education institute of the Ministry of Defence. In the spring of 1945 he got into American custody in Austria. In the POW camp he was recognised by Major Mayoa LS Army officerwho placed 313 in the Los Angeles moden pentathlon games. The Majortransported Somfay and his wife back to Budapest personally. Between 1945 and 1947 he received his Colonel's salary but he was not trusted with any tasks as it usually happened to the army officiers who returned from American custody. in 1948 he was forced to retire and in 1951 his pension was suspended and he and his family was interned to the village of Alap. His former fellow athletes and colleagues, Karoly Takacs25 and his friend Bela Szepes26 were appealing to Gabor Peter (head of 1A Unger's modified time, 23.8 s was the same as the result of an­ AVH, the infamous State Protection Authority) to annul other athlete in his heat, the Italian Contoli. The two competitors probably finished the same time and that would have given a the decision but they got the answer: "Yes, we know clue to the jury that Unger’s measurement was off. In the 6'" heat that he is an honest person but he is not welcomed to Somfay won with a commanding lead before Svoboda, in case of a protest estimating Somfay's actual time would have been difficult. be in Budapest." 15 Nemzeti Sport, lV J u ly 1 9 2 A , p. 6.

Finally it was "Cucu" Bozsik27 and Gusztav Sebes28 who 16 ies Jeux de la VIII* Olympiode, Paris 192A, Rapport Officlel, p. i a 6 successfully presented his case to Interior Minister Laszlo 17 Hazigazda. 18 Volker Kluge: Somfay Elemer, a "megcsalt" olimpiai bajnok, in: Pirosand in 1954 Somfay was allowed to move back to Magyar Olimpiai Akademia (vkonyve zoig, p. 229. Originally: lunge Budapest. He got a jab in the athletics division of the Welt, 28mJune 1976, p. a, Budapest Spartacus, initially as a storage worker, later 19 Nemzeti Sport - the leading sport newspaper in Hungary 20 The contemporary newspapers wrote Somfay's name with an 'i' in­ as a full time coach. Unfortunately he was notable catch stead of an 'y'. According to Somfay (from the 1979 TV interwiew): up with the athletics life and in 1958 he was forced to "I received nothing for my success in the Paris Olympics; only in 1927, three years after the Games the minister of internal affairs retire again. modified the 'i' at the end of my name to 'y'. Thus they gave me According to Somfay he did not receive much a noble name." Although the privileges of the Hungarian nobility recognition in his later years: "For my 70"’ birthday I were abolished in the second half of the 19"'century, still coming from a noble family meant social prestige and it helped greatly in received the bronze level of the sport medal, the same making a career in the service of the state and somewhat in the level was awarded to the worker who mowed the lawn private sector too. Most of the Hungarian family names have an for Imre Nemeth29. For my 75th birthday I received the T ending (for example 31% of the Hungarian Olympics medallists have such names, 211 out of 683) and the noble families used to gold level. For my 8 on birthday I received nothing, they write 'y' instead of V . So Elemer Somfay’s official name was Elemer just forgot it." J0 Stromfeld until 1905, and Elemer Somfai between 1905 and 1927. As he got older he was hurt by the missed chance Nevertheless, in the 192A Olympics's Official Report he appears as Somfay since the management of the Hungarian team registered in Paris more and more, he felt that he was robbed him under that name. from his Olympic championship title in 1924. Onto 21 Nemzeti Sport, S’* July 1929, p. 1. 22 Ibid, p.2 his gravestone he asked for the epitaph: "Beside his 23 Elemer Somfay: Atletika es treningje, 1929. beloved wife here lies - Colonel vitez Elemer Somfay - 2A Hazigazda. Xaxa - Olympic champion of Paris 1924. - All-time 25 Karoly Takacs, the legendary one-handed Olympic champion shooter. He won rapid-fire pistol in 1998 and 1952. According to Hungarian champion -1898-1979". ■ Somfay: "My former subordinate in sergeant rank. I got an electric six-silhouettes shooting range installed for him in SPOTI paid from my own pocket and that helped him to his Olympic title." 26 Bela Szepes won a silver medal in javelin throw at the 1928 Summer 1 'Xaxa', the nickname o; Elemer Somray (he even got it carved onto Olympics in Amsterdam. Also a charicaturist and sculptor. his headstone), comes 'ram a popular American jungle movie from 27 Jozsef "Cucu" Bozsik played 100 times for the national football the 1920s. During the races Somfay’s hair was flying through the air team. In the 1950s he became a represantative in the Hungarian and that reminded the fans to the long haired female protagonist, Parliament Xaxa. 28 Gusztav Sebes, coach (manager) of the "Mighty Magyars" 2 Gymnasium was an ed rcational institute for students between 10 29 Imre Nemeth was the 1998 Olympic champion in hammer throwing, and 18 years of age. As a first grader he was 11 years old. bronze medallist in 1952. He Is the father of Miklos Nemeth, 1976 3 Karoly Ambrdzy was the athlete of BEAC (Budapesti Egyetemi Olympic champion in javelin. He was also the director of the Atletikai Club), living and training in Nagybecskerek. He won the National Stadium between 1953 and 1980. Hungarian championship in in 1919 and 1918. 30 Hazigazda. A Sporthirlap, 10" July 19a*, p. A. 5 Possibly post traumatic stress disorder. 6 Elemer Somfay's father, Janos Somfai was a journalist. He changed Set in stone: "Somfay the family name to scund more Hungar an in 1905, until then Elemer / XAXA / the whole family, inc uding Elemer had had the family name Stromfeld. Janos Somfei's brother, Colonel Aurel Stromfeld (1978­ Olimpiai Bajnok I Paris 1927) was a staff officie- in the Austro-Hungarian army during the 1929". Gold or silver? - First World War. on his gravestone he 7 The translation uses p atoon to map it to the Engllsh-American army structure. In reality the Austro-Hungarian army had slightly is honoured as an different structural elements. Olympic champion. 8 Kaiserlich und koniglich (Imperial and Royal), the army of Austria- Hungary Photo: Barnabas Nagy Art hive 9 L3szl6 Feleki: "Somfay Elemer 75 eves", in: /Cepes Sport, 28'" August 1973, P- 18. The article was published in the sport magazine for Somfay's 75"" birthday. 10 He had pain in the heel of his left foot which he usually used for takeoff, that is why he had to use his right foot. 11 Hazigazda: Somfay Elemer - "Xaxa az drbkds bajnok”, Magyar Televizid 1 9 7 9 . It was Somfay's last television interview, made a couple of month befor? his death. Somfay talked for 50 minutes about the events of his life in a clear and elaborated manner. 12 livari Yrjola’s brother, Pzavo Yrjola won the gold medal in decathlon in 1928 in Amsterdam. 13 Nemzeti Sport, n ,hJuly 1329, p. 5 .