His major international debut came at the 1970 IAAF World Race Walking Cup held in Eschborn, West Germany. There he placed sixth in a time of 4:14:50 hours. He was mostly behind East German opposition but he and silver medallist Veniamin Soldatenko helped the Soviet Union to comfortably take the team silver medals.[5]
On his return to the competition at the 1975 IAAF World Race Walking Cup he defeated all opponents by a margin of over six minutes, in a new best of 4:03:42 hours. Team mate (and one of the favourites) Soldatenko was disqualified for lifting. This performance made Lyungin the only Soviet man ever to win that title at the IAAF World Race Walking Cup. It was nearly a quarter of a century before a man from a former Soviet country topped the 50 km walk podium (Kazakhstan's Sergey Korepanov doing so in 1999). Lyungin was also the protagonist in the Soviet Union's first men's team title at the competition.[6] At 37 years old, he remains the oldest person to have won the 50 km cup title.[5]
Lyungin's third a final major international race was at the 1976 World Championships in Athletics – a one-off event following the dropping of the 50 km distance as an Olympic event. He ended the competition in sixth place and was the second highest ranked Soviet in the race, after the winner Soldatenko.[7]
