Officially, the Games from 1924 to 1965 were called the International Silent Games in English or Jeux Internationaux Silencieux in French....
The Games took place in Helsinki, Finland, in 1961.
595 athletes from 24 countries (Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Italy, Austria,
Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland, Greece, Poland, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Romania, Germany, Soviet Union, Iran, New Zealand, Canada and the USA) participated in these Games with sports such as athletics, basketball, diving, gymnastics, swimming, water polo, football, cycling, shooting, table tennis and tennis.
Canada & Turkey participated for the first time in the Silent Games...
Notable facts were:
- all athletes for the first time all stayed in one place in the Olympic Village;
- all other residents of this Olympic Village were impressed by the simplicity of communicating smoothly with each other with all the deaf athletes all over the entire world;
- Svetlana Slepneva, a gymnast and the sprint star Klavidia Pavlunina both from the Soviet Union were both top athletes who won were able to win 5 and 3 gold medals respectively in their sports;
- In the medal standings we saw : the Soviet Union finished in 1st place with 71 medals (31 gold, 20 silver and 20 bronze), while USA achieved 35 medals (2nd place with 13 gold, 12 silver and 10 bronze) and Germany took 3rd place with 32 medals (12 gold, 9 silver and 11 bronzen medailles).
Belgium participated with 26 athletes and won 1 silver medal:
- Basketball in 4th place
Belgium vs New Zealand = 35-11
Belgium vs Italy = 48-43
Belgium vs Finland = 47-75
Poland vs Belgium = 63-41
USA vs Belgium = 111-33
Ranking:
1. USA
2. Finland
3. Poland
4. Belgium
Players : Jean-Claude Billen (°1941), Isaac Dorn (°1934), Jean-Pierre George (°1931), Raymond Moens (°1944), Michel Philippart (°1940), Edmond Rousseau (°1941), Maurice Tastenoy (°1942), Charles Van Laer (°1934) and Urbain Werbrouck (°1931).
- Tennis
- Michel Francois (°1935): singles and doubles (with Joseph Goldwirt).
- Joseph Goldwirt (°1920) : singles and doubles (with Michel Francois).
- Football with 1 silver medal
1/2 final : BEL vs Tsechoslovakia = 3-1.
Final : Belgium vs Yugoslavia = 1-4
Players : Raphaël D'huyvetter (°1940), Dion De Clerck (°1939), Amaat De Ro (°1935), Werner Deschamps (°1934), Roger Durant (°1939), Roger Leuridon (°1935), Edward Michiels (°1938), Emmanuel Rossel (°1938), Willy Seeuws (°1924), Bonaventure Sempels (°1937), Robert Van den Broucke (°1935), Roland Van Hoorebeke (°1939), Jozef Wellens (°1942) and André Xhibitte (°1943).
