06/06/2020
I have had the pleasure of speaking to Mr. Nazif, A nationwide treasure of Iran in the 1980’s, and a current citizen of the US.
I would like to begin the story tracing back to when Mr. Nazif began lifting in 1980. He began his journey training with one of the best Iranian coaches of the 50’s and 60’s Mr. Davood Behtaj. Mr. Nazif began training as a young man in the small town of Ardbil, Iran. He had 9 brothers and a hard-working father who worked tirelessly to provide for his 10 sons. Behnam trained twice each day, once at 9am to 12pm and the next at 4pm till 8pm.
His first competition, and by far the easiest for him was his first international competition, which took place in Ligano-Sabb, Italy in 1981. Within this competition, he secured 8th place which motivated him to achieve further.
The following year in 1982, The Asian Championships were being hosted in New Delhi, India, which he participated in. Unfortunately, he had caught malaria the night of the competition. This displayed his resilience as it did not hold him back and he continued to compete. During the championships, his shoulder had also begun presenting complications, but he was determined and continued to thrive to secure the Asian Championship medal of 1982. He attempted the Asian World record and managed to secure 200.5kg.
He proceeds back to Iran where he was greeted with disappointment as there was no government reception, which correlates to the fact that he was not from the capital city, Tehran. This was during the Iran-Iraq war, so his country was experiencing fundamental crisis.
This set-back motivated him to train even harder to compete in the world championship in Brazil 1982.
He began an 11-day journey to arrive at the competition where secured third place, as a clean and jerk winner- along with 2 medals. On the 11 day journey back to Iran, he lands in Austria where he is welcomed by an Iranian figure who proposes he should reside in Austria- where he was offered money to stay, however, he declines this offer and makes his way back to Tehran, only to find out, he will not be getting any attention from the Iranian weightlifting federation.
While this was happening, his teammates living in Tehran were receiving substantial care, this included a large sum of money, a house and a car. Mr. Nazif, however, was not entitled to that.
The following year in the national championships in Syria, he was nicknamed by the Iranian national TV ‘Hercules rostam’- this made him believe that maybe the federation was sympathizing with his wellbeing and might have provided him with better access to training, or at least some financial support.
Upon his arrival in Iran, he realizes that it was not the case, yet again. He still decides that he wanted to stay in Iran to try further- where he returns to the scene in Tabriz, dominating another Asian championship and winning gold on his second lift! He wanted to go for the Asian and World record attempt but was told by the coach (name kept confidential) to ‘step down and not do his 3rd lift’. This allowed a team-mate of his (Taymori) an upper hand, gaining more time and assistance by the coach to win another gold medal. Mr. Nazif continued and sn**ched 167.5kg and clean and jerk 213.5kg. The decisions that the national coaches made for him had angered him tremendously.
He was full of youth and an outcast amongst the city boys but was still regarded as someone from a village. He felt extremely out of place as on his visit to Tehran, he was approached by an undercover government officer (Kommiteh) and was told that he was favored amongst the people in his town and should work alongside the government to enforce laws pushing for the dress code in which the government had implemented at the time. This made Mr. Nazif mad in regard to the situation he was experiencing controlled by the federation. He had enough. If he did not follow what the undercover staff had dictated, he would have jeopardized his and his family’s lives.
He decided to borrow some money that he used to bribe the embassy of Pakistan, so he could secure a visa to the United States. In 1986 he manages to secure the visa. This opened a new chapter of his life, enabling him to study, train and work full time, where he went head to head with the best American lifters at the time e.g. Mr. Jeff Micheal.
The year 1992 arrives where Olympic Barcelona was taking place. He managed to sn**ch 155kg, only 5kg behind the winner! to achieve a higher position, he decided to try out 207.5kg clean and jerk, in which he misses the jerk by 7.5kg. He was one of the top lifters in the US. He was even given the nickname ‘mystery man’ by the ESPN sports channel.
He qualifies with ease for the Olympics but unfortunately the US weightlifting federation immediately altered the policy that ‘non- national citizens cannot complete in the Olympics’ in every single American competition, he was tested and was always clean. He was never invited to train in camp by the federation and felt yet again, out of place- the fact that he was not from American, contributed to the fact that he was treated differently.
He was given many offers by many coaches, especially in Texas, but after that event, he decides to gradually step away from olympic lifting and in 1995, says his final goodbyes to olympic weightlifting.
I have asked him about his plans in regards to his retirement and he has stated that he has a dream of ‘retiring in the Caribbean’ his aim is to help and give back to those who would not be getting any additional support that many lifters- including himself have experienced and is wishing many federations from around the world to do the same for their lifters.
