Records
| Standing records prior to the 1981 season in track and field | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| World Record |  Yuriy Sedykh (URS) | 81.80 m | July 31, 1980 | Moscow, Soviet Union |
This page lists the World Best Year Performances in the year 1981 in the Men's Hammer Throw . (The women did not compete in the hammer throw until the early 1990s.) The world record was broken in the previous (1980) year by Soviet Union's Yuriy Sedykh at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, Soviet Union.
| Standing records prior to the 1981 season in track and field | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| World Record | Yuriy Sedykh (URS) | 81.80 m | July 31, 1980 | Moscow, Soviet Union |
| Rank | Mark | Athlete | Venue | Date | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 80.56 m |  Klaus Ploghaus (FRG) | Obersühl, West Germany | 27.06.1981 | PB |
| 2 | 80.18 m | Yuriy Syedikh (URS) | Tbilisi, Soviet Union | 27.06.1981 | |
| 3 | 79.60 m | Sergey Litvinov (URS) | Gateshead, United Kingdom | 18.07.1981 | |
| 4 | 78.72 m |  Roland Steuk (GDR) | Berlin, East Germany | 20.06.1981 | PB |
| 78.72 m | Karl-Hans Riehm (FRG) | Gelsenkirchen, West Germany | 19.07.1981 | ||
| 6 | 77.84 m | Pavel Ryepin (URS) | Leningrad, Soviet Union | 30.08.1981 | PB |
| 7 | 77.50 m | Igor Nikulin (URS) | Leningrad, Soviet Union | 27.12.1981 | |
| 8 | 77.26 m | Jüri Tamm (URS) | Budapest, Hungary | 18.08.1981 | |
| 9 | 77.14 m |  Mariusz Tomaszewski (POL) | Poznań, Poland | 28.07.1981 | PB |
| 10 | 76.84 m | Aleksandr Kozlov (URS) | Stavropol, Soviet Union | 05.06.1981 | |
| 11 | 76.76 m |  Harri Huhtala (FIN) | Ylivieska, Finland | 19.07.1981 | PB |
| 12 | 76.68 m | Anatoliy Yefimov (URS) | Kaunas, Soviet Union | 29.06.1981 | PB |
| 13 | 76.64 m | Juha Tiainen (FIN) | Stockholm, Sweden | 29.08.1981 | PB |
| 14 | 76.34 m | Aleksandr Bunyeyev (URS) | Gorkiy, Soviet Union | 08.06.1981 | |
| 15 | 75.84 m |  Emanuil Dyulgerov (BUL) | Sofia, Bulgaria | 06.06.1981 | PB |
| 16 | 75.74 m | Aleksey Spiridonov (URS) | Leningrad, Soviet Union | 19.08.1981 | |
| 17 | 75.66 m | Manfred Hüning (FRG) | Nancy, France | 23.05.1981 | |
| 18 | 75.56 m |  Giampaolo Urlando (ITA) | Palo Alto, United States | 28.03.1981 | |
| 19 | 75.54 m | Olyeg Dyatlov (URS) | Stavropol, Soviet Union | 05.06.1981 | |
| 20 | 75.30 m | Aleksandr Gurmazhenko (URS) | Kyiv, Soviet Union | 02.10.1981 | PB |
| 21 | 75.04 m | Anatoliy Prokopyenko (URS) | unknown | ??.??.1981 | |
| 22 | 75.02 m | Mikhail Rusanovskiy (URS) | Kharkiv, Soviet Union | 27.08.1981 | PB |
| 23 | 74.90 m | Aleksey Malyukov (URS) | Sochi, Soviet Union | 31.05.1981 | |
| 24 | 74.86 m | Yuriy Tarasyuk (URS) | Kyiv, Soviet Union | 27.08.1981 | |
| 25 | 74.80 m | Leszek Woderski (POL) | Chorzów, Poland | 20.09.1981 | PB |