Today Oldest Olympians is working towards finalizing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Today we wanted to begin looking at the many Egyptian participants who meet this definition and, since we ended on wrestlers from Korea, that is where we are going to start with Egypt.

Only one of the wrestlers, Abbas Ahmad, competed in both styles, doing so as a middleweight. In both Greco-Roman and freestyle, he was eliminated in the second round. Ahmad was the Egyptian middleweight, freestyle champion in 1943 and was competing at the senior level by 1938, so his age is likely on the older end of the scale and he is almost certainly deceased, but we have not been able to confirm this. It is also unclear where he was from, as sources have him born in Cairo but competing for an Alexandrian club, which was relatively uncommon at the time.

Kemal Munir was definitely from Cairo, although he was a member of a nearby Giza club, Tersana. He took part in the welterweight, Greco-Roman event and was also eliminated in round two. Also similar to Ahmad, he was competing as early as 1936, albeit as a light-middleweight or middleweight, and seems to have switched his weight class after World War II. In 1959, he was serving as Secretary of the Southern Provinces Wrestling Federation, but we have no information on him past that date.

Our other Cairene wrestler is Ragab El-Zaim, who was eliminated in round two of the light-heavyweight, freestyle category. El-Zaim was competing at the senior level in 1941 and was runner-up at the national championships in 1943. He went on to win a silver medal as a heavyweight at the inaugural Mediterranean Games in 1951, but after that we know no further details.

Our Alexandrian Egyptian is Ibrahim Abdel Hamid, who lasted until the end of round four of the featherweight, freestyle division. A member of the Tram Club, our earliest evidence of him competing only goes back to 1944 and, due to his common name, we have been unable to uncover any more details.

Finally, the competitor about whom we know the least is Mahmud Abdel ‘Aal, who was eliminated in round three of the flyweight, Greco-Roman tournament. Unlikely the others, we do not even know where he was from or have any details on his competitions outside of the Olympics. Thus, we find this to be a good place to end this entry, but we will be back soon with more Egyptian Olympic mysteries!

Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Today we wanted to present the second part of our look at Korean competitors who meet this description.

(Choi Hang-Gi)

Five of the remaining competitors took part in the weightlifting tournament in London. Of them, Lee Gyu-Hyeok got the closest to the podium when he finished fourth in the bantamweight division. Na Si-Yun, meanwhile, would go on to reach the podium at a different major international tournament, taking silver as middleweight at the 1954 Asian Games, after having placed seventh as a lightweight in London. Lee Yeong-Hwan, who was 16^th as a lightweight in 1948, also took silver at the 1954 Asian Games, but as a heavyweight. Rounding out the list, Park Dong-Uk, whose name is also seen as Pak Dong-Uk, was 10^th as a bantamweight, while Choi Hang-Gi competed in the featherweight category, but did not record a mark in the military press portion and thus did not complete the event. Aside from the details mentioned above, we know nothing about the lives of any of these participants.

The rest of our athletes were all freestyle wrestlers. The most successful was Kim Seok-Yeong, who competed as a lightweight and was eliminated in round four. Kim Kuk-Fan was eliminated in round two of the featherweight division, while Han Sang-Ryong survived to round three in the bantamweight category, but only by virtue of a bye in the first round. As with the weightlifters, we do not have any biographical details on these competitors.

That addresses our Korean Olympic mysteries from 1948, which leaves us with only one more nation to cover from that tournament: Egypt. Since this is our area of specialty, we will be treating those entries with extra attention, and will start publishing them in the near future. We hope that you will join us!

Oldest Olympians is saddened to learn that Italian sailor Antonio Carattino, born April 2, 1923, died July 3 at the age of 101. Carattino competed in three editions of the Olympic Games, finishing 9th in Dragon class in 1952, and 7th and 5th in the 5.5 metre class in 1956 and 1968 respectively. His entire life was spent on the open water as a sailor, and two of his older brothers, Domenico and Giuseppe, also competed in sailing at the Olympics, with the latter having lived to the age of 95.

(Giacomo Mosele)

At the time of his death, Carattino was the oldest living Italian Olympian, oldest living Olympic sailor, and oldest survivor of the 1968 Mexico City Games. The new oldest living Italian Olympian is Giacomo Mosele, born July 30, 1925, who finished 34^th in the 18 kilometers cross-country skiing event at the 1952 Oslo Games. The new oldest living Olympic sailor is Freddy Ehrström, born August 29, 1925, who was 14^th in the Star class at the 1960 Rome Games and is also the oldest living Finnish Olympian. Finally, the new oldest survivor of the 1968 Mexico City Olympics is Domini Lawrence, born May 8, 1925, who took part in the equestrian dressage tournament in 1968 and 1972. She is also the oldest survivor of the 1972 Games and the oldest living British Olympian.

Today Oldest Olympians is continuing its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Today we wanted to begin looking at Korean competitors who meet this description but, since there are so many, we will be dividing them into two blog posts.

(The 1948 Korean Olympic basketball team, pictured at SBS News)

First, just as with China, there are several members of the basketball team, which finished eighth in the tournament, about whom we know very little. Bang Won-Sun, Gang Bong-Hyeon, Lee Jun-Yeong, and Lee Sang-Hun are all members of the team about whom we have no information, not even a club. For a fifth, Chang Ri-jin, who also competed in Berlin in 1936, we have more information, including a date of birth of October 28, 1917, but we have been unable to locate any information on his death.

(Lee Yun-Seok, left, and Sim Bok-Seok, right).

Secondly, we want to highlight two Korean track and field athletes. Lee Yun-Seok represented his country in the 800 and 1,500 metres events, but was eliminated in the first round of both. Sim Bok-Seok, meanwhile, was a long distance runner and he was eliminated in round one of the 5,000 metres. He was also entered into the 10,000 metres, but did not start the event. For both, we have no information about them outside of their Olympic participation.

Today Oldest Olympians is returning to its look into mystery competitors from the 1948 London Olympics for whom we lack both a date of birth and confirmation as to whether they are alive or deceased. Given the time that has passed, nearly all of these Olympians would be at least 90 years old, but there is a possibility that some are still alive. Today we wanted to look at four Chinese participants who meet the criteria:

(The Chinese 1948 Olympic basketball team, pictured at Chinaqw.com)

Three of the four who we are looking at today were members of the basketball team the placed 18^th out of 23 nations. Two of the team members moved to other countries after the Games, which may be why their subsequent activities have been difficult to trace. Cai Zhongqiang of Shanghai’s Dagong Basketball Team moved to Malaysia, while Yu Jin of the Philippine Overseas Chinese Team returned to his home nation after the Olympics. A third, Songyuan “John” Pao, was the leading scorer for the team, yet we still know almost nothing about him. This lineup, incidentally, also featured Wu Chengzhang, who is now 100 and the oldest living Chinese Olympian.

The fourth, Li Dahui, was part of the football squad that was eliminated in round one. We know more about him because, in addition to participating in the Olympic tournament, he also won a gold medal with Taiwan at the 1954 Asian Games. He was still playing in 1956, but after this information on him becomes scarce.