SALIMIKORDASIABI Behdad IRI at the top of his pull on a world record 214kg snatch at the 2011 World Weightlifting championship Paris, France.

This was the session everyone was waiting for, and the main protagonist SALIMIKORDASIABI didn’t disappoint his fans. There were many stories floating around that he had made Wr’s in training. In the training hall in France he made an easy 200kg snatch and was geared for more but his coach stopped the onslaught. He also cleaned an easy 255kg only to miss the jerk. SALIMIKORDASIABI  finally broke  the  213kg world record held by of countryman REZAZADEH Hossein. Behdad pretty much annihilated the competition beating second place teammate ANOUSHIRAVANI HAMLABAD Sajjad by 25kg in total. I would be fairly certain that the CJ and total record will fall soon.

AKKAEV Khadzhimurat RUS 105kg world champion 2011

I haven’t photographed  Akkaev before, and it certainly was worth making this trip to do so.

Ivanov Artem UKR 94kg cleans 227kg at 2011 World Weightlifting championship in Paris

Artem Ivanov of Ukraine really put some pressure on 2008 Olympic champion Ilya Ilyin.  Artem finished in second place tied with gold medalist Ilya Ilyin with a 407 kg total. I would guess that Ivanov has a 415kg total in him for London 2012.

Snatch sequence of Artem Ivanov

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

IVANOV Artem UKR 94kg

ROSTAMI Kianoush IRI 85kg narrowly misses a WR 219kg

The young 20 yr old from Iran dominated the category, narrowly missing 219kg CJ WR on his 2nd attempt. He missed the clean with the same weight on his 3rd attempt. Defending Olympic champion Lu CHN bombed in the CJ. Rostami appeared to have his 2nd attempt jerk a little in front, he recovered forward off his rear foot (instead of pushing back off his front foot). This technique with maximum weight is rarely successful. However with the weight out front he had little or no choice other than run to forward.

PODOBEDOVA Svetlana KAZ 75kg

The photo tells the story, defending 2010 World champion Podobedova KAZ was defeated by EVSTYUKHINA Nadezda RUS.