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The 75th Men`s and 18th Women`s World Championships are going on in Santo Domingo. Impressive fields are fighting exciting battles for the medals and their countries`Olympic places.

Men’s 56kg: Two Chinese were at the start among the 32 competitors and they were expected to gain a few medals. Surprisingly, however, only one of the Chinese stood through the end, because one of the country`s biggest stars, Wu Meijin – a man only Mutlu could defeat – dropped out in both snatch and in clean and jerk. Last year`s snatch world champion Li Zheng eventually won in this category, adding the total honours to his snatch gold medal. The total medals were shared by China, Cuba and Vietnam. In clean and jerk, Cuba celebrated a new world champion: Sergio Alvarez Boulet.

Men’s 62kg: In a field of 42 athletes once again there were two Chinese and once again one of them got eliminated. The unfortunate was Zhang Ping, whereas the ultimate winner was Qiu Le, thus defending his world champion title from Doha. The two other steps of the total podium were occupied by Colombia – major success for this country. Manuel Minginfel won a surprising silver medal for FSM (Federated States of Micronesia).

Qiu Le CHN

Men`s 69kg: There were altogether 32 competitors in the start list. Olympic champion Nicolai Peshalov was to compete in group B and ? although weighed in and introduced ? failed to appear on stage, referring to an injury in the warming up. In what proved to be an excellent and thrilling contest, Olympic and multiple world champion Chinese Shi Zhiyong got defeated by Frenchman  Vencelas Dabaya in the total. Having represented Cameoon in the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens where he was 5th, Dabaya moved to France and won his first medals last year in Doha for his new country. As France celebrated its last total world champion in 1922, Dabaya put an end to 84 years of dearth. (Daniel Senet was the last French to win a gold in the World Championships, but only in snatch. That happened exactly 25 years ago in Lille.) Dabay’s happiness was doubled when he learned that he became weightlifting`s 500th World Champion and received the special IWF Award for this honour.

Vencelas Dabaya FRA