MOSCOW, December 24 (R-Sport) – Two-time Olympic champion Soviet weightlifter Arkady Vorobiev has died at the age of 88, the Russian Weightlifting Federation said Monday.

Vorobiev took the Olympic gold at the 1956 Games in Melbourne and defended it four years later in Rome in the under-90kg division.

The federation said Vorobiev, who went on to become a doctor of medicine and author of several books on weightlifting, passed away on Saturday.

“On December 22, the outstanding athlete and scientist, two-time Olympic champion Arkady Vorobiev died at the age of 88,” the federation said on its website.

“The Russian Weightlifting Federation expresses its deepest condolences to the family and relatives of Arkady Nikitich.”

In an extraordinary lifetime, Vorobiev served in the marine infantry during World War II and was awarded with a Medal for Courage before turning to weightlifting, where he also became a five-time world and European champion.

In 1995, Vorobiev was inducted into the International Weightlifting Federation Hall of Fame.