Varteres has an older brother, Rafael Samurgashev (born 1963), who was a member of the Armenian national Greco-Roman wrestling team at the 2000 Summer Olympics and is now the vice president of the Russian Wrestling Federation.
Schneider made his official debut for the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, where he placed second in the preliminary pool of the men's 74 kg class, against Russia's Varteres Samurgashev, Ukraine's Volodymyr Shatskykh, and Sweden's Mohammad Babulfath.