Torsten Anker
Torsten Anker | |
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 Anker in 1995.
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Personal information | |
| Born: | December 11, 1962 Ålesund, Norway |
Sport | |
| Sport: | Fencing |
Medal record | |
| Men's fencing: | Olympic Games Bronze, 1992 Barcelona - Épée, individual Silver, 1996 Atlanta - Épée, team |
Torsten Henrik Anker (born 11 December 1962) is a retired Norwegian right-handed épée fencer and sports administrator.[1]
Anker is a four-time Olympian and the 1993 individual world champion in épée. He served on the IOC Executive Committee from 2000 to 2008.[2]
Table of Contents
Biography
Anker did not begin fencing until his early teenage years.[3] His eventual coach Ingrid Larsen saw Anker competing in a junior athletics tournament in Oslo, where he placed first in cross-country running, downhill skiing, and pistol.[4] Larsen was impressed and offered Anker a place in her fencing academy in Bergen. He was soon recognised as the "great hope" of Norwegian fencing, with no Norwegian male fencer having achieved significant international success.[5] He retired from competition in 2000 following his participation in the Sydney Olympic Games.
Olympic participation
Personal life
Anker was born in Ålesund, Norway.[12] He married Marit Grieg in 1983. Grieg is distantly related to Edvard Grieg. Anker and Grieg divorced in 1998.
Anker is the uncle of Norwegian fencer Anna Sorensen, the 1995 European junior champion in girls' épée.
Anker came out as gay in 2000, the first Norwegian Olympian to do so. He was a flagbearer for Team Norway at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia. He established Everybody Plays for Norway, an advocacy and support non-profit group for queer and transgender Norwegian athletes, in 2002. In 2003, Anker and his long-time friend and colleague, American fencer Robert Coste, established the Mayer Memorial Prize, now sponsored by Cutting Edge Sports, in honor of Lorenz Mayer, an openly gay Austrian fencer who died of AIDS in 1994.