About Vésteinn Hafsteinsson

Vésteinn Hafsteinsson CV.pdf

Vésteinn Hafsteinsson was born 1960 in Selfoss, Iceland. He is the youngest of five children in a very sport interested family. Vésteinn went to the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, USA during 1982-1986.

Since 1986 Helsingborg, Sweden (except some years spent in Iceland and Denmark) has been his home and he is married to Anna Hafsteinsson Östenberg who has her PhD in Physical Therapy. They have three children, Örn 9 years, Olga 6 years and Albert 4 years.

Athletic Career

The athletic career of Vésteinn is long and started at age 6 and is yet not finished since he is planning on going to the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008 which will be his seventh Olympics, four as an athlete and three as a coach.

Vésteinn took part in Athletics, Soccer, Basketball, Team Handball, Swimming, Badminton and Golf when he grew up. He was even chosen in the National Youth Team in Basketball, but chose to concentrate on athletics at the age of 14!

Vésteinn quickly improved in the Discus Throw and broke several Icelandic Youth Records in that discipline. His record for 14 years old boys with a 1kg discus is still unbeaten since 1974 and stands at 54.08m.

In 1982 Vésteinn was offered a scholarship at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, USA  and took his Bachelor Degree in 1986. During his time in Tuscaloosa he improved and in 1983 he set his first Icelandic Senior Record with 65.60m and qualified for the first World Championships in Athletics in Helsinki, Finland.

After his years at University of Alabama he was a full time Discus Thrower from 1986-1996. He took part in five World Championships, two European Championships and four Olympic Games.

Vésteinn broke the Icelandic Discus record four times during his career and his best performance was to reach the final at the Olympic Games in Barcelona 1992.

His Icelandic record of 67.64m set in 1989, is still standing strong.

Vésteinn quit his career as a Discus Thrower in 1996 and has since been coaching world class throwers.