Naim Süleymanoglu, originally a Bulgarian Turk with native name Naum Suleimanov, was born on January 23, 1967, in the village of Ahatli (Ptiçar) in Mestanli district of Kircaali province, Bulgaria. He fled the communist regime in Bulgaria in 1986 and sought asylum in Turkey, where he continued his sports career.
Nicknamed "Pocket Hercules" due to his height of 147 cm (4 ft 10 in) and weight of 60 kg (137 lb), Suleymanoglu started weightlifting when he was 9 years old. At the age of 15, he won two gold medals at the World Junior Weightlifting Championships held in Brazil, becoming the champion. At the age of 16, he broke a record and became the youngest world record holder in weightlifting history. During his career, he won three gold Olympic medals, seven World Championships and six European Championships. He broke the world record 46 times. At the age of sixteen, he made history as the second weightlifter to lift three times his body weight in the clean and jerk category.
He achieved a magnificent victory by breaking six world and nine Olympic records in the 60 kilogram featherweight category at the 1988 Seoul Olympics. He became the first athlete to win a gold medal for Turkey outside of wrestling in Olympic history. He made history by lifting 190 kilograms, three times plus 10 kilograms more his own weight in the clean and jerk, and being the only person in the world to achieve this.
Naim Suleymanoglu was declared "Weightlifter of the Year" three times in 1984, 1985 and 1986. In 2000 and 2004 he was elected as the member of the International Weightlifting Federation Hall of Fame. He was awarded the Olympic Order in 2001.
Suleymanoglu passed away in Istanbul on November 18, 2017 due to liver failure.