[2] Lipp's achievement, however, was discounted or disbelieved in the West, because the Iron Curtain policies of Joseph Stalin did not allow foreign observers, so there was no way to verify the results.
[citation needed] Competing in 1952, he probably would not have challenged eventual gold-medal winner Mathias, but a silver medal was well within the range of possibility.
[citation needed] (Lipp's training was hampered when his scholarship was revoked in another Estonian repression in 1950, and he had to stalk deer and track small game animals daily to sustain himself.
[3] After Estonia broke from the Soviets in early 1990s Lipp came to United States for a Goodwill Games in Seattle as a guest of the US Chamber of Commerce.
He was out of favour with the authorities and did not get his chance to appear on an international stage until Barcelona when, at the age of 76, he proudly carried the Estonian flag at the opening ceremony of the 1992 Summer Olympics.