Olympic weightlifting photography

World Weightlting Championships 2009, Goyamg City, South Korea

Competition Nov20 to Nov 29-2009

Nov17-2009

Monster competition hall being prepared Monday am, it is to be ready by Thursday. This one of 5 halls at the KINTEX. The size is astonishing, each of these halls could house a 747 pretty easy. Hope to catch the Chinese train tomorrow at Jang Mi-Ran gym. Then from thursday onward all training will be at KINTEX the competition site. I read that South Korea is the 11th largest economy in the world, no expense is being spared putting on this competition.

Nov18-2009

Dabaya of France is the consummate professional weightlifter. He was following Russian methodology of a big taper the week leading up to the competition

The day was a smörgåsbord of training exercises and philosophies. Nothing new for me as I figure I've seen everything in my 40+ yrs of lifting. The trick is putting the pieces together. Like life itself, I'm sure it will make a whole lot more sense on my death bed.

China training

Nov18-2009

Watching China today exceeded all my expectations. They will decimate the competition. They are in a class by themselves. I know a few of the Chinese from past worlds, there a lots of new faces. It will take me until the end of the championships to sort out names.

Watched Turkey today. They are in big trouble. The 48kg women Taylan and Ozkan are the best of the team. Its sad when an aging Sudas 34 yrs old is almost best of the men, other than Bilgin 62kg.

Watched the Columbians. I will keep my eye on the two 62kg lifters Salazar and Fiqueroa (who I hope will redeem himself from his disastrous Olympic performance). As I was leaving after a long day, the Columbians were in for their 2nd session.

Nov19

I waited to see RUS and BLR train. They didn't show..or at least when I was at the training hall. A lot of time was spentwatchfully waiting. Patience is not one of virtues, so says my wife. It is true. I watched three Indonesian lifters, I believe all were Beijing olympians. Very good technicians, especially in the snatch. A couple of photos in the slide show below.

A picture of a Cuban. Why? They train to move QUICKLY with weights. The training hall is full of lifters who are strong, BUT those who are strong and quick....not so many.

The Koreans were last. Watched the super An. This guy is seriously strong. Watched him strict muscle snatch 120kg. The CJ was 230kg I believe. Contrary to the jerk photo he didn't lock out his arms quickly and was a bit lackadaisical in pushing his body under. He knew it too, as he sheepishly showed the coach what he did with his arms.

Sa 77kg just played around with light snatches and heavy strict presses for single...go figure.

The KOR 56kg started his workout with a warm up repetitious jog around a 20 m length of gym mats, it looked funny but probably made more sense than other warm ups I've seen.

Nov 21

56kg class

Men's 56 kg El Maoui Khalil

2008 Jr Word Champion 56kg
Won bronze medal at Sr worlds in Korea on only his 1st lift of 125kg...impressive!!
He wanted to know if I was selling photos, I said he'd probably have to wait until next year. This is next best thing

Long CHN wins the 56 kg class, was there any doubt. He tried a Jr and Sr WR CJ with 169kg

Nov 22

Highlight was the women's 53 kg class where Chinshanlo KAZ set Jr World record with 129kg in CJ. She just turned 16 yrs old, shades of Süleymanoğlu.

1	CHINSHANLO Zulfiya	25.07.1993	KAZ	52.99	A	90	129	219
2	CHEN Xiaoting	11.01.1991	CHN	52.51	A	95	123	218
3	YOON Jin-hee	04.08.1986	KOR	52.64	A	93	116	209
4	CONTRERAS Yuderqui	27.03.1986	DOM	52.63	A	91	111	202
5	CHEREMSHANOVA Svetlana	21.08.1985	KAZ	52.99	A	92	110	202

Nov 23

Belly dancers at half time

It was not quite super bowl entertainment, but it was a worthwhile divergence dring the 10 minute break between the two lifts. The championships have been reasonably humdrum so far. It totally promises to heat up considerably starting tomorrow with the 77kg. This class should have lots of fireworks. It only promises to get better thereafter.

Nov 24

Men's 77kg class

True to form the 77kg class was a barn burner with two World records by Lu China 174kg snatch and 378 kg total. Sa of Korea the 2008 Olympic gold medalist tried a WR 212kg twice only to narrowly miss the jerk. He achieved gold in the CJ with 205kg, his only medal of the championships.

From press conference

Answers to Jim Schmitz's usual questions. When did you start weightlifting? and best Back squat?

Lu started at 18 yrs old. He was a 200 meter runner. He back squats 300kg. Su started at 10 yrs old he back squats 300kg also.

Nov 25

Women's 63kg class

This was a tough A session to lift in. Most competitors were starting with around 105kg in the snatch.

The surprise was the disappointing result of the Chinese lifter Guo.

1	MANEZA Maiya	01.11.1985	KAZ	62.62	A	105	141	246
2	TSARUKAEVA Svetlana	25.12.1987	RUS	62.91	A	111	135	246
3	SIMSEK Sibel	10.10.1984	TUR	62.43	A	108	135	243
4	SAVENKO Viktoriya	28.05.1988	RUS	62.89	A	112	130	242
5	GUO Xiyan	17.09.1987	CHN	62.54	A	105	135	240

Nov 26

Lu China Olympic champion 2008 weightlifting

autographed pic of Lu from 2007 worlds.Macklem photography

The 85kg class goes today, without the star performer Rybakou BLR. Olympic champions Lu China looks to be in good shape and should win convincingly.

The 85kg class somewhat fizzled as the Olympic champion Lu's winning total here was 11 kg down from his total in Beijing. Also three lifters didn't appear in the A lineup as scheduled. A couple of bulked up 77kg lifters from Beijing, Kuznetsov and Lahun made nice performance at their new body weight. Poghsyan of ARM also added to the excitement with an impressive 208 kg CJ.

Lu CHN lifted well within himself, seemly doing just enough to win.

Nov27

Christine Girard Canada's best and most consistent performer went 6 for 6 ending with 132kg CJ at her new BW class of 69kg. She was 4th in Beijing in 63kg class. Congratulations to her and her coach Yovan Fillion. She has back squatted 180kg.

The two Korean 94kg class lifters finished 3rd and 4th overall, a very good showing. Neither lifter was at Beijing. Seon-Jong Kim took the gold in the CJ with 218kg. After this point it was somewhat dramatic as Sedov the ultimate world champion and KIm both had 1 lift left. So 221 kg was called for Kim, the weight was changed for 222kg for Sedov, another change 223kg for Kim, another change of 225kg for Sedov, which he made a half hearted attempt in the clean. The stage was set for Kim to finally take 226kg. He causally took the stage and cleaned 226kg with effort only to become stuck at the top. A very good attempt and very doable in the future. So a dramatic conclusion was not to be.

Nov28

Mi-ran Jang Korea the Olympic champion 2008 put on quite a show for the standing only hometown crowd. After an initial miss and then 2nd attempt success with 174kg in the CJ she jumped to an astonishing WR mark of 187 kg. A 13 kg jump for a new world record. An exciting day for all.

Nov29

The premier event in weightlifting; the super heavy weights. The big guys who lift the most weight.

1	AN Yong-Kwon	15.10.1982	KOR	142.23	A	198	247	445
2	UDACHYN Artem	26.03.1980	UKR	158.90	A	200	245	445
3	SHYMECHKO Ihor	27.05.1986	UKR	133.82	A	202	225	427
4	MOHAMED ABDEL RAHMAN Abdel Rahman	19.05.1989	EGY	122.15	A	185	230	415
5	EHSSAN ATTIAA Mohamed	11.01.1984	EGY	149.38	A	185	230	415
6	VELAGIC Almir	22.08.1981	GER	133.72	A	185	228	413
7	KOZLOV Andrey	27.09.1982	RUS	145.75	A	180	231	411

Dec 3

One of the big untold stories from my perspective was the young team from Egypt with many junior world medalists now preforming well at the senior level.

The pair of 77kg lifters Yehia and Ramadam pushing each other to greater heights. Both Yehia and Ramadan 77 kg BW did MANY singles in the range 145 to 155 kg. They are only 22 and 21. They seemed to have a friendly rivalry in training. Probably the closest thing to Bulgarian training that I witnessed. The lifter on this set moved the weight onto the rubber runner for some reason. I guess he wanted me to get a side shot ....GRIN

Dec 5

Bruce Klemens has photographed some of the best lifters of the 70's and 80's, producing some of the the best action shots of the stars. I purchased a couple of his photos and as you can see, got them autographed for fun. Both lifters were very obliging. Somewhat surprising was Kurlovich's reaction of wanting to show the photo to his friends "because they forget or have forgotten" about this past lift and total. Sad but true.

David Rigert weightlifting Olympic medalist world record holder
David Rigert

Alexander Kurlovich weightlifter world record holder
ALexander Kurlovich

the supers

Carpe Diem

Seize the day, with several supers out of the lineup that exactly what An did.

An of Korea just waited for Udachyn to select his 3 rd attempt and his mandate was clear to then add 2kg more to the bar to win the total on BW. That is precisely what he did in front of the hometown crowd. Udachyn came ready and was fired up on all his lifts. Displaying Alexevian girth he moved quicly. Up in BW from Beijing by 15kg.
The Iranian in the training hall did a 200kg snatch easily and 240kg CJ easily, numbers like 210kg and 260kg were coming to mind. However the worlds is open to all comers and those that made a platform apperance and preformed should not be understated.
The 20 yr old Egyptian kid looked awesome with a big future ahead of him.

The old warhorse Scerbatihs made good on a 195kg snatch before withdrawing in CJ, I'm not sure why. Perhaps an observation from his training was applicable; it took him ages to warmup and stretch his worn body and 15 minutes of icing both knees was mandatory. Make no mistake, performing at this level for years on end is punishing on the body. He is the embodiment of my favorite quote;

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

Although Shymechko failed to improve and put in 427kg total for 4th place I believe he will be a strong contender in London as he matures and puts on some body weight I would certainly expect at least 460kg in the next year or two. Chigishev and Steiner were missed as they surely would have been medalists.
Kozlov reminded me of a bear, but never came close to the famous Russian "grizzly bears" of the past. Was this perhaps the Russian mens team weakest performance at a worlds?