Attila Spiriev
Who is Attila Spiriev?
Shortly:
* Co-founder and owner of All-Athletics.com
* Former international athlete
* Statistician
* Athletes manager
* Meeting organizer
* Former sports journalist
* Qualified coach
* Son of Dr. Bojidar Spiriev
* Husband, father of three sons
Some more details:
Attila Spiriev (b. 1964) is the co-founder of All-Athletics.com. They founded the most comprehensive worldwide athletics database website with his father, Dr. Bojidar Spiriev (1932-2010). Attila is the owner and Managing Director of ELITE Ltd, the company which owns and operates All-Athletics.com. Attila and his wife Andrea have three sons, Olivér (b.1991), Teodor (b. 1992) and Artemon (b. 2002).
Attila was an international athlete. He was born in an athletic family with his father being a national 400m hurdles champion and his mother a national long jump champion. In fact Attila is a fruit of a track and field love affair as his father (with a Macedonian origin and then a Bulgarian citizen) moved to Hungary to marry Irén „Baby” Kun.
Attila was 5th at the European Junior Championships in 1983 in the 400m Hurdles (51.15 sec) and in 1986 he improved his PB to 49.98 sec. The talented hurdler’s career however became short. Let’s not forget it was still a communist regime in Hungary. Attila, who, was coached mainly by his mother and partly by his father, refused both to switch to a “politically more correct” trainer and to go into the doping system. It resulted that just a few days before the Stuttgart European Championships, despite the fact that he was qualified, he was “invited” to the army. A real army. Bad conditions, sever back injury, his athletic career was practically over by the time he was out of the army. He was 23 then.
He began working as a sport journalist in the Hungarian News Agency (MTI) while continued assisting his father in creating the World Ranking System which was based on the Scoring Tables, authored by Dr. Bojidar Spiriev.
In the meantime a major political change has happened in Hungary, the borders have opened, providing more opportunities for the young man speaking several languages. While he went on working in the news agency he became editor-in-chief of the monthly ‘Atlétika’ magazine and started to help some of his parents’ athletes to get to some international meetings. He was only 26 when he gave up his promising sport journalist career for becoming the Managing director of ELITE Ltd. He was personally most involved in Athletes representation, in event organization and in the statistical work (World Rankings, Scoring Tables).
Attila still represents some top international athletes, but when All-Athletics.com was launched he decided to go on working with just a very few of them.
Attila is proud that he was one of the early managers who fought hard for the benefit of the Athletes and his fellow managers. He played a significant role in the negotiations with the IAAF which finally led to prize money payment at the World Championships and he was one of those who helped managers become members of the IAAF Family – so natural for all those newcomer ‘agents’ nowadays.
Besides several other athletes, Attila represented the followings. It’s quite an impressive list:
Maxim Tarasov (RUS) – Olympic, World and European Champion, Pole Vault
Balázs Kiss (HUN) – Olympic Champion, Hammer Throw
Andrey Abduvaliyev (UZB) – Olympic Champion, 2 x World Champion, Hammer Throw
Yuriy Borzakovskiy (RUS) – Olympic Champion, 800m
Olga Shishigina (KAZ) – Olympic Champion, World Indoor Champion, 100m Hurdles, 60m Hurdles
Tatyana Dorovskikh (UKR) – Olympic Champion, 3 x World Champion, World Indoor Champion, 1500-3000m
Yuliya Nosova-Pechonkina (RUS) – World Record holder, 2 x World Champion, 400m Hurdles, 4x400m
Olga Bryzgina (UKR) – 3 x Olympic, 2 x World Champion, 400m, 4x400m
Irina Yatchenko (BLR) – World Champion, 2 x Olympic Bronze medallist, Discus Throw
Igor Paklin (KGZ) – Former World Record holder, World Indoor Champion, High Jump
Robert Emmiyan (ARM) – European Record holder, European Champion, WCH Silver medallist, Long Jump
Igor Astapkovich (BLR) – European Champion, 2 x World Silver medallist, Hammer Throw
Lyudmila Rogachova (RUS) – European Champion, World Indoor Champion, Olympic Silver medallist, 800-1500m
Igor Kazanov (LAT) – 3 x European Indoor Champion, former World record holder, 60m Hurdles
Tibor Gécsek (HUN) – European Champion, World Bronze medallist, Hammer Throw
Denis Kapustin (RUS) – European Champion, Olympic Bronze medallist, Triple Jump
Aleksandr Klimenko (UKR) – European Champion, Shot Put
Vladimir Dubrovchik (BLR) – European Champion, Olympic and World Silver medallist, Discus Throw
Inna Lasovskaya (RUS) – World Indoor Champion, European Champion, Olympic Silver medallist
Galina Malchugina (RUS) – World Champion, 4x100m, World Bronze medallist, 200m
Natalya Dukhnova (BLR) – European Indoor Champion, World and European Silver medallist, 800m
Nikolay Antonov (BUL) – European Indoor Champion, 200m
Dmitriy Bogdanov (RUS) – European Indoor Champion, 800m
Andriy Skvaruk (UKR) – World Silver medallist, Hammer Throw
Georgi Dakov (BUL) – European Bronze medallist, High Jump
Tünde Vaszi (HUN) – European Bronze medallist, Long Jump
Vyacheslav Shabunin (RUS) – Russian 1500m record holder, one of the most consistent international runners
… and many other Athletes who won medals or were in the finals of major championships.
Nowadays the limited time available allows Attila to work only with a very few Athletes, mostly Hungarians:
Yaroslav Rybakov (RUS) – World Champion, World Indoor Champion, High Jump
Zoltán Kővágó (HUN) – Olympic Silver medallist, Discus Throw
Krisztián Pars (HUN) – World Silver medallist, Hammer Throw
Marcell Deák Nagy (HUN) – European Junior Champion, Universiade Champion, World Junior silver medallist, 400m
Krisztina Papp (HUN) – World Championships finalist, 5000m-Half Marathon
Tamás Kazi (HUN) – World Championships semi-finalist, 800m
Attila has organized several athletic meetings, currently he is the Sports Director of the Memorial István Gyulai Hungarian Athletics Grand Prix and of the Hopp Parádé jumping series.
The greatest performance achieved in an event organized by Attila was Daniel Komen’s world 3000m indoor record of 7:24.90 which he ran in Budapest in February 1998. It is still an untouchable world record.
Outside of his track and field activities Attila is reknown in the Mastino Napoletano (a dog breed) world. He was president of the Columella Molosser Club of Hungary for ten years and he helps his wife, Andrea in operating one of the most successful Mastino Napoletano breeding in the world, the 'Fruit d'Amour kennel'. Attila is also president and co-owner of a basketball club. Their adult team plays in the Hungarian second division and they operate several teams in different age-groups, providing basketball playing opportunities for over a hundred children and youngsters.
“I was practically born into athletics,” said Attila. “Most I know I have learned from my parents. I have been fortunate to have worked with very many top people, great coaches, athletes, athletic experts from all over the world, but I have never met anybody as addicted to our sport as my Father was. He simply adored athletics and he had an extremely comprehensive, deep and wide knowledge. Despite being an ‘insider’, he could always keep his ‘outside’ view on our sport as he was a world class hydro-geological engineer. All-Athletics.com is based on his huge work and we try our best to live up to his genius.”
