Lev Matveyevich Vainshtein (also "Vaynshteyn" and "Lew Weinstein"; 12 March 1916 – 25 December 2004) was a Soviet world champion and Olympic bronze medalist in shooting.

Early life

Weinstein was born into a Jewish family from

Yekaterinburg Yekaterinburg (, ; ), alternatively Romanization of Russian, romanized as Ekaterinburg and formerly known as Sverdlovsk ( ; 1924–1991), is a city and the administrative centre of Sverdlovsk Oblast and the Ural Federal District, Russia. The ci ...

Perm Governorate Perm Governorate (), also known as the Governorate of Perm, was an administrative-territorial unit ('' guberniya'') of the Russian Empire and the Russian SFSR from 1781 to 1923. It was located on both slopes of the Ural Mountains, and its admi ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

Shooting career

Vainshtein was affiliated with the Dynamo St. Petersburg club in

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

. He won a bronze medal in shooting at the

1952 Olympics 1952 Olympics refers to both: *The 1952 Winter Olympics, which were held in Oslo, Norway *The 1952 Summer Olympics The 1952 Summer Olympics (, ), officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad (, ) and commonly known as Helsinki 1952, were a ...

Helsinki Helsinki () is the Capital city, capital and most populous List of cities and towns in Finland, city in Finland. It is on the shore of the Gulf of Finland and is the seat of southern Finland's Uusimaa region. About people live in the municipali ...

, in the free rifle

300 metre rifle three positions 300 m rifle three positions (formerly known as one of four free rifle disciplines) is an ISSF shooting event, involving shooting 40 shots each from the prone, the standing and the kneeling positions. Men and women both shoot the same number of shot ...

, as his teammate Anatoli Ivanovich Bogdanov won the gold medal, and Robert Bürchler of Switzerland won the silver medal. He came in fifth in the men's

50 metre pistol 50 meter pistol, formerly and unofficially still often called Free Pistol, is one of the ISSF shooting events. It is one of the oldest shooting disciplines, dating back to the 19th century and only having seen marginal rule changes since 1936. I ...

(60 shots). He also won a number of world, European, and USSR championships in his career. He won gold medals as part of the Soviet Union team in both the

25 metre center-fire pistol 25 meter center-fire pistol is one of the ISSF shooting events, and is normally a men-only event. Its origin lies in competitions with military-style service pistols, and as such its history dates back to the 19th century. 25 meter pistol (fo ...

and the

in the 1954 World Championships in

Caracas Caracas ( , ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern p ...

. Four years later, he again won a gold medal with the Soviet team in the 50 metre pistol at the 1958 World Championships in Moscow, and was part of the Soviet silver medal-winning Soviet team in the 25 metre center-fire pistol. Vainshtein coached the Soviet shooting team at the 1964 Olympics.

Publications

''Sportskytte med pistol och revolver''
Lew Weinstein, Svenska Sportskytteförbundet, 1961
''Sportliches Schiessen mit Faustfeuerwaffen''
Lew Weinstein, Dt. Schützenbund, 1979

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weinstein, Lev 1916 births 2004 deaths Sportspeople from Yekaterinburg People from Yekaterinburgsky Uyezd Jewish Russian sportspeople Soviet male sport shooters ISSF pistol shooters Shooters at the 1952 Summer Olympics Olympic shooters for the Soviet Union Olympic medalists in shooting Russian male sport shooters Jewish sport shooters Soviet Jews Olympic bronze medalists for the Soviet Union Medalists at the 1952 Summer Olympics 20th-century Russian sportsmen

Early life

Shooting career

Publications

See also

References