Kamandar MADZHIDOV

Born in Georgia to an Azerbaijani family, Kamandar Madzhidov took up wrestling in 1973. At the start of the 1980s his family moved to Minsk, Belarus and he made the Soviet national team in 1984. Madzhidov, who competed in the Greco-Roman featherweight class in the first part of his career, was selected for the Soviet 1984 Olympic team, but missed the Games, and a possible medal, due to the Soviet boycott. Instead, he competed at the Friendship Games and won gold in Greco-Roman featherweight. Four years later, Madzhilov was again selected for the Soviet Olympic team and this time won featherweight gold. After the Olympics, Madzhilov moved up to lightweight and, after missing the 1992 Games, made his last appearance at the Olympic arena in 1996, where he represented newly independent Belarus, but had to settle for fourth place in lightweight. In addition his Olympic gold, Madzhilov was World Champion in 1986 (featherweight) and 1989 (lightweight), European Champion in 1984, 1985 (featherweight) and 1991 (lightweight) and won silver at the 1987 (featherweight) and 1993 World Championships (lightweight) and bronze at the 1993 European Championships (lightweight). He also won the 1990 World Cup. Madzhilov never captured a Soviet title, winning a featherweight silver in 1987 and bronze in 1983 and 1984, but he won the 1992 CIS title.

Madzhilov finished his sporting career after the 1996 Olympics and later worked as a wrestling coach. From 1998-99, 2000-03 and since 2005 he was coach of the Belorussian national Greco-Roman team and from 1999-2000 he was head coach of the Kazakh national Greco-Roman team, while in 2003 he coached the Greek national team and in 2004 he coached the Turkish national team.