Gholamreza Takhti was born on August 27, 1930 and died at the young age of 37 on January 7, 1968. During his illustrious career, he won three Olympic medals, and numerous world, Asian, and national medals. It was his manners and what is known today as 'fair play' that made him the legend he is.

Takhti was raised in a poor family in Khaniabad, southern Tehran. He started his training at a young age but had to go to various clubs to get the necessary coaching. He moved out of Tehran to become an oil worker. He was then drafted to the Iranian army and was subsequently introduced to free style wrestling. He won his first Iranian championship in 1950, and a year later, in the Helsinki World championship, became the first international medal winner for Iran.

Takhti started as a middleweight wrestler. In the 1952 Helsinki Olympics and when he was only 22 years old, he managed to win the silver medal in the 79kg weight category. Four years later in Melbourne, he went one better and along the other great Iranian wrestler, Emam-Ali Habibi, became the first Olympic gold winner for his country.

This was achieved in the 87kg weight category. He became the world champion in 1959 and was heavily tipped to win his second Olympic gold medal in Rome. However, he could only manage another silver. This is the best record ever achieved by an Iranian athlete. As he was getting heavier, he decided to move up to the next weight, 97kg, for the Tokyo Olympics in 1964. But this proved to be one competition too many for the great champion.

Takhti was extremely popular and considered by most Iranians as not only a great champion, but also a `national hero' who would stand against the tyrant and ruthless regime. Many experts suggested that he was not really up to the task of competing in the 1964 Olympic and the following world championships. He was in fact forced to take part in. Officials reckoned once he lost his matches in big tournaments, people would simply lose interest and forget about what he stood for. They were wrong. His popularity grew ever larger, and in January 1968, when the news of his apparent suicide broke out, most Iranians refused to believe it. Many said he was killed by an injection of air into his blood vessels. Others talked of a cold-blooded assassination. Whatever happened in that sad day, the memory of Pahlevan (hero) will forever stay with his fans.