Wolfgang Böhme

Right winger Wolfgang Böhme was on the East German handball team at the 1972 München Olympics that unfortunately lost the bronze medal match, 19-16, against Romania. He earned 192 international caps and scored 538 goals. Böhme won a silver (1974) and a bronze medal (1978) at the World Championships. In 1978 in their hotel room during the night he explained to West German players Heiner Brand and Kurt Klühspies the tactics of the Soviet Union, their final opponent – and West Germany won the gold medal.

Only three months ahead the Moskva Olympics Böhme was thrown out of the East German national team for unknown reasons. Böhme himself explained that he had an offer from the West German club THW Kiel and the Ministry of State Security (Stasi) had heard about that. He was then banned from the first and second handball leagues in the former GDR due to his planned Republikflucht (“desertion from the republic”). He then became a sports teacher and later a doorman.

Böhme married luger Ute Rührold but divorced in 1980 and married twice again. Together with his third wife he was allowed to move to West Germany legally in 1989. In West Germany he worked as a handball coach and later moved to Switzerland. During his time in East German he wrote in his diary noting every doping practice around him. He himself was given oral Turinabol (dehydrochloromethyltestosterone) by his coaches since he was 19-years-old. His twin brother Matthias also became a sports teacher and handball coach in Switzerland.