# Athletics at the 1959 World Festival of Youth and Students

The 7th World Festival of Youth and Students featured an athletics competition among its programme of events. The events were contested in Vienna, Austria in August 1957. Mainly contested among Eastern European athletes, it served as an alternative to the more Western European-oriented 1959 Universiade held in Turin the same year.
Four reigning men's champions from the 1958 European Athletics Championships were present at the competition: high jumper Richard Dahl, long jumper Igor Ter-Ovanesyan, javelin thrower Janusz Sidło and discus thrower Edmund Piątkowski (the latter a world record holder at the time). Sidło's fifth win in Union Internationale des Étudiants (UIE) competition made him the most successful individual athlete of the competition's history.
In the women's competition, Vera Krepkina did a 100 metres/long jump double and she became Olympic champion in the latter event a year later. The emerging Tamara Press dominated the shot put and discus throw (a year later she became an Olympic champion in both disciplines). Iolanda Balaș, reigning European champion at the time, retained her high jump title for a fourth straight UIE win.

## Medal summary
### Men

| Event | Gold | Gold | Silver | Silver | Bronze | Bronze |
| 100 metres | Jerzy Juskowiak (POL) | 10.5 | Edvin Ozolin (URS) | 10.6 | Reinhard Seidler (GDR) | 10.7 |
| 200 metres | Jerzy Kowalski (POL) | 21.4 | Vilém Mandlík (TCH) | 21.5 | Edvin Ozolin (URS) | 21.5 |
| 400 metres | Jerzy Kowalski (POL) | 48.2 | Jaroslav Jirásek (TCH) | 48.5 | Vilém Mandlík (TCH) | 48.9 |
| 800 metres | Siegfried Valentin (GDR) | 1:49.3 | Traian Sudrigean (ROM) | 1:51.0 | Ingemar Hägglund (SWE) | 1:52.9 |
| 1500 metres | Siegfried Valentin (GDR) | 3:49.4 | Witold Baran (POL) | 3:51.1 | Hans Grodotzki (GDR) | 3:54.0 |
| 5000 metres | Friedrich Janke (GDR) | 14:12.6 | Aleksandr Artinyuk (URS) | 14:13.2 | Osvaldo Suárez (ARG) | 14:14.4 |
| 110 m hurdles | Anatoliy Mikhailov (URS) | 14.4 | Ivan Veselský (TCH) | 15.3 | Georgi Kaburov (BUL) | 15.5 |
| 400 m hurdles | Hans Dittner (GDR) | 53.4 | Ingvar Carlsson (SWE) | 53.9 | Elio Catola (ITA) | 54.1 |
| High jump | Igor Kashkarov (URS) | 2.09 m | Jiří Lanský (TCH) | 2.03 m | Richard Dahl (SWE) | 2.00 m |
| Pole vault | Gerhard Jeitner (GDR) | 4.30 m | Ihor Petrenko (URS) | 4.20 m | Peter Laufer (GDR) | 4.20 m |
| Long jump | Igor Ter-Ovanesyan (URS) | 7.61 m | Branko Miler (YUG) | 7.02 m | Peter Becher (GDR) | 6.90 m |
| Triple jump | Oleg Ryakhovskiy (URS) | 15.21 m | Y. Sidorov (URS) | 14.82 m | Karl Thierfelder (GDR) | 14.57 m |
| Shot put | Fritz Kühl (GDR) | 16.12 m | Dako Radošević (YUG) | 15.62 m | Manfred Grieser (GDR) | 15.12 m |
| Discus throw | Edmund Piątkowski (POL) | 57.87 m | Manfred Grieser (GDR) | 54.60 m | Fritz Kühl (GDR) | 52.54 m |
| Hammer throw | Heinrich Thun (AUT) | 61.23 m | Olgierd Ciepły (POL) | 60.70 m | Imre Trényi (HUN) | 58.95 m |
| Javelin throw | Janusz Sidło (POL) | 76.53 m | Vladimir Kuznetsov (URS) | 75.08 m | Alexandru Bizim (ROM) | 74.27 m |

### Women

| Event | Gold | Gold | Silver | Silver | Bronze | Bronze |
| 100 metres | Vera Krepkina (URS) | 11.7 | Gisela Birkemeyer (GDR) | 11.9 | Olga Šikovec (YUG) | 12.2 |
| 200 metres | Lyudmila Ignatyeva (URS) | 24.4 | Gisela Birkemeyer (GDR) | 24.5 | Antónia Munkácsi (HUN) | 24.6 |
| 400 metres | Maria Bienia (POL) | 58.5 | Bedriška Kulhavá (TCH) | 58.8 | Antónia Munkácsi (HUN) | 60.0 |
| 80 m hurdles | Gisela Birkemeyer (GDR) | 10.9 | Alena Stolzová (TCH) | 11.3 | Draga Stamejcic (YUG) | 11.4 |
| High jump | Iolanda Balaș (ROM) | 1.75 m | Taisiya Chenchik (URS) | 1.70 m | Margarita Fatyanova (URS) | 1.55 m |
| Long jump | Vera Krepkina (URS) | 6.12 m | Teresa Wieczorek (POL) | 5.98 m | Hildrun Claus (GDR) | 5.75 m |
| Shot put | Tamara Press (URS) | 16.65 m | Johanna Lüttge (GDR) | 15.25 m | Judit Bognár (HUN) | 15.09 m |
| Discus throw | Tamara Press (URS) | 55.80 m | Štepánka Mertová (TCH) | 51.20 m | Irene Schuch (GDR) | 50.75 m |
| Javelin throw | Alevtina Shastikova (URS) | 54.33 m | Dana Zátopková (TCH) | 54.09 m | Biruté Zalogaitité (URS) | 52.25 m |

## Medal table

| Rank | Nation | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
| 1 | Soviet Union (URS) | 10 | 6 | 3 | 19 |
| 2 | East Germany (GDR) | 7 | 4 | 9 | 20 |
| 3 | Poland (POL) | 6 | 3 | 0 | 9 |
| 4 | Romania (ROM) | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| 5 | Austria (AUT) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 6 | Czechoslovakia (TCH) | 0 | 8 | 1 | 9 |
| 7 | Yugoslavia (YUG) | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4 |
| 8 | Sweden (SWE) | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| 9 | Hungary (HUN) | 0 | 0 | 4 | 4 |
| 10 | Argentina (ARG) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 10 | Bulgaria (BUL) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 10 | Italy (ITA) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Totals (12 entries) | Totals (12 entries) | 25 | 25 | 25 | 75 |