Career
Born in Leipzig, Saxony, Hellmann was sixteen years old when she began participating in the event. In 1977 she gave the participants" oath at the opening of the East German gymnastics and sport festival. That summer she set the world record for 16-year-olds with a throw of 55.00 meters.
She was unable to compete at the 1984 summer Olympic games due to her country"s boycott.
On 6 September 1988 she threw the discus 78.14 meters, further than anybody had ever thrown it before or after. However, this throw was in an unofficial tournament in the East German training camp at Kienbaum set up to decide the final German Democratic Republic place for the Olympic games in Seoul and was not eligible to be considered a world record.
During this session she threw the following incredible distances: 76.92m - 78.14m - 70.52m - 76.56m - 75.66m - 74.04m. Ilke Wyludda threw a life-time best 75.36 m, but had to stay home.
This result only ranks her tenth on the world all-time list and sixth among German discus throwers, behind Gabriele Reinsch, Ilke Wyludda, Diana Gansky-Sachse, Irina Meszynski and Gisela Beyer.
After the 1992 Summer Olympics, where she was eliminated during qualification, she retired. She later was the head of a sports group of the insurance company AOK and became a manager at a cabaret in Leipzig. Hellmann represented the South Carolina DHfK Leipzig sport club and trained with Rolf Wittenbecher and Bernhard Thomas.
During her active career she was 1.78 meters tall and weighed 81 kilograms.