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PRK’s women head home from Norway with a 100 per cent record after Song Kuk Hyang’s remarkable victory at 69kg on day six of the IWF World Championships in Forde. Song took all three of Olivia Reeves’ world records on 120-150-270 despite declining two of her attempts.

The men won plenty of medals too, and the team can expect a heroes’ welcome when they return to Pyongyang. “All our citizens will be proud of us. I hope our people will be at the airport to give us a warm welcome home,” said Songnam Jang, vice-president of the PRK Weightlifting Federation and team leader in Forde.

Song Kuk Hyang (PRK)

Head coach Kim Chun Hui, arguably the most successful coach in the sport, said, “We expected very good results here and we got them, especially from the women.”

Since PRK returned to the world stage in 2023 after a four-year Covid-related absence, they have topped the medals table at the Asian Games and a series of other world or continental competitions, setting many world records along the way.

Next on their schedule is the Asian Youth Games in Bahrain in the last week of October. “We have prepared strong teams of younger athletes and now we hope for more good results in Bahrain,” said coach Kim.

All five winners in Norway won world titles last year, too. The plan was for Song, 24, to compete against Reeves, the American Olympic champion, at 69kg in Forde, but Reeves moved up and lifts at 77kg on Wednesday.

Ri Suk (PRK) mobbed by fans when leaving the venue (Photo by Brian Oliver)

Sunday’s 63kg winner Ri Suk was mobbed by a group of teenage girls as the team left the Fordehuset venue half an hour after Song’s victory, and posed for photos with them. Other team members joined in, and Jang told the girls, “This is the world champion coach,” as he introduced Kim.

Song took the snatch world record on her second lift, the clean and jerk and total on her fourth, and declined numbers three and six. She finished 29kg clear of the Colombian Julieth Rodriguez on 110-131-241.

Ingrid Vanesa Segura, a former team-mate of Rodriguez who lifts for Bahrain, made five good lifts before failing on 137kg when going for a junior world record on total. Segura, 19, looked highly impressive in making 107-134-241 in third place.

Julieth Rodriguez (COL)

Chen Wen-Huei from Chinese Taipei, a bronze medallist at the Tokyo Olympic Games, took clean and jerk bronze from the B Group on 132kg and finished fifth. The first two in this year’s 71kg World Juniors, Charlotte Simoneau from Canada and Olivia Selemaia from New Zealand, both made only two good lifts in seventh and eighth place.

There was a world record for PRK in the men’s 88kg too, by Ro Kwang Ryol in clean and jerk. But Yeison Lopez from Colombia outdid Ro with two world records, snatch and total, becoming the first champion from the Americas in Forde.

Lopez and Ro made nine good lifts between them while the other 10 athletes struggled. Between them, they made only 15 good lifts. Three men bombed out in snatch and three more in clean and jerk.

Ro Kwang Ryol (PRK)

The Chinese junior Pan Yunhua did it in both, failing six times in a row. He was desperately close with the last one at 206kg, good enough for a clean and jerk medal, but he lost it behind. The crowd felt his pain and cheered him off the platform.

Two athletes from Korea, Park Hyeongo and Jo Daehee, made one snatch and one clean and jerk between them. The others who failed to make a total were Lucas Mueller from Germany, the Armenian Suren Grigoryan and his former team-mate Andranik Karapetyan, who now lifts for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Yeison Lopez (COL)

Not surprisingly, there was a medallist from the B Group. Arley Mendez from Chile won  snatch silver and finished fourth on 172-196-368. Marin Robu from Moldova was third with two good lifts on 169-200-369.

Lopez, 26, broke his own snatch world record with his second lift, then failed on 180kg. He finished 177-210-387, taking the record on total with his final attempt. Ro, 24, was too far behind to catch Lopez but his 215kg clean and jerk was a record. He made 162-215-377.

By Brian Oliver

Photos by Giorgio Scala/Deepbluemedia