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The 2019 IWF Grand Prix closes with great success and a Junior World Record

The 2019 IWF Grand Prix ODESUR CSLP in Lima, Peru was one of the highlights of the IWF calendar beside the World Championships, which concluded last weekend where the audience saw many impressive results and a Junior World Record. Prior to the competition, South American Weightlifting Confederation held its Annual Congress, with the participation of 14 Member Federations. The Pan American Weightlifting Federation held its last Executive Board meeting of its four years period, where the EB decided to hold its next Electoral Congress in the Dominican Republic. On this exclusive, invitation-only championships, 72 athletes (38 women and 34 men) from 24 countries of 4 continents competed to win prize money and to qualify for the 2020 Olympic Games, as the Grand Prix was also a Silver Level Qualification Event. Columbia topped both gender’s medal table (women: 5,5,1; men: 8,4,0). At the women, China (4,2,0) and Canada (3,0,1) followed, while at the men’s table, Venezuela (3,0,3) and Dominican Republic (2,3,1) rounded up the top three. CIKAMATANA Eileen returned to international stages after changing her nationality from Fiji to Australia. The 20-year old athlete not only won the women’s 87kg bodyweight category by beating the 2018 World Champion AO Hui (CHN) but also set a new Clean and Jerk Junior World Record at 151kg.   The achievement was rewarded with loud applaud by the audience – it is the first World Record set by an Oceanian weightlifter since 1993! Quality Media has produced and distributed worldwide the 2019 Grand Prix Lima with 8 hand cameras and 1 crane camera. It has been broadcasted on television in 20 countries, more than 30 local media covered the event and online live streaming was available all around the world, generating more than 300.000 viewership. The event welcomed several important sports leaders, including Iván Dibós, Bernard Rajzman and Camilo Perez, IOC Members; National Olympic Committee Presidents of 6 countries along with Dr Tamás Aján, IWF President and several IWF EB Members. Dr Tamás Aján and Ángel Velmori Niño, President of the Nicaraguan Weightlifting Federation were honoured with Lifetime Achievement Rewards by the South American Weightlifting Confederation in the San Marcos University of Peru, which is the longest operating university in the Americas. “I would like to congratulate the Peruvian Federation for organizing this prestigious event and I thank the Peruvian government for the continuous support and investments in weightlifting. I really hope this is the beginning of a tradition and we will come together in Peru every year from now on. I was happy to see the same sports equipment was used on the competition as on the 2019 Pan American Games - a great opportunity for weightlifting to contribute to the living legacy of the successful Games,” said Dr

WADA to launch its new ‘Athlete Central’ Whereabouts App in November 2019

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) announced that, in November 2019, the Agency will launch ‘Athlete Central’, its new App that will facilitate athlete compliance with Whereabouts rules under the global anti-doping program. Athlete Central will replace WADA’s current App that has been operational for a few years and required modernizing. Whereabouts rules, which are a key component of global sport’s crucial out-of-competition testing programs, are part of the International Standard for Testing and Investigations. The rules require a limited number of top-level athletes within a Registered Testing Pool (RTP) to provide their Anti-Doping Organization (ADO) with details of where they can be found for one hour every day. WADA Director General, Olivier Niggli, said: “WADA is looking forward to launching Athlete Central, which will dramatically improve the athlete experience in complying with their Whereabouts requirements under the global anti-doping program. It will be an easy, fast and secure way for athletes to provide their Whereabouts to support out-of-competition testing and demonstrate their commitment to clean sport.” Prior to initiating development of Athlete Central, WADA’s project team actively sought athlete feedback to better understand their needs. The team was pleased to receive 2,500 unique submissions that then shaped the App’s specifications. In addition, in the lead up to its November launch, some ADO staff have been testing the App and a significant number of active athletes have been trialing it to file their Whereabouts. WADA Deputy Director, Standards & Harmonization and Principal, ADAMS Advancement, Stuart Kemp, said: “WADA was determined that, with Athlete Central, the Agency would be offering a platform that would address the needs of its key beneficiary – the athletes. Their feedback was clear – the App must be intuitive, simple, smart and reliable.  We believe that this is what we are delivering and we of course look forward to more feedback following its launch.” Athlete Central, which is powered by WADA’s Anti-Doping Administration & Management System (ADAMS), has the following attributes: Smart App for improved accuracy Location-based address recommendations Intuitive user interface requiring less support & training Supports all types of Whereabouts pools, including RTPs Improved adherence to International Standard for Testing and Investigations (ISTI) requirements A dedicated Help Desk For more information, please: visit the Athlete Central page of WADA’s website; and view the teaser video. About ADAMS ADAMS is a secure and cost-free, web-based system that centralizes doping control-related information such as athlete Whereabouts, testing history, laboratory results, the Athlete Biological Passport, Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) and information on Anti-Doping Rule Violations. In 2017, significant upgrades to ADAMS’ underlying infrastructure laid the foundation for the complete rebuild of ADAMS which will serve all athletes and anti-doping stakeholders better going forward. Referred to as ‘Next Gen’ ADAMS, the rebuild prioritizes mobility of ADAMS use, enhanced connectivity, reliability and performance, as well as general usability. All of ADAMS’ new features are also designed with privacy, information security, and transparency for end users as a priority. Planning and development of Next Gen ADAMS first focused on the development of Athlete Central. Other modules are to follow, which WADA will communicate to stakeholders in due course. Source:

Weightlifting Brings Korean Youth Together again In Pyongyang

Young weightlifters from both North and South Korea demonstrated the power of sport to unite people in friendly and peaceful competition at the recent 2019 Youth and Junior Asian Weightlifting Championships held in Pyongyang. The competition also served as a Gold Level Qualification Event for Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. A delegation of 65 from the Republic of Korea crossed the border into the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), as they headed north to participate in the Championships. A total of 18 junior athletes were accompanied by 20 youth athletes and a 27-strong support team that included coaches and officials. They followed in the footsteps of senior athletes, as weightlifting already brought together Korean athletes in 2013, for the Asian Cup also held in Pyongyang. As a sport with universal appeal, weightlifting has disproportionately contributed to the DPRK’s medal success at the Olympic Games. At the London 2012 and Rio 2016 Olympic Games, weightlifting accounted for four of the team’s six gold medals. The 2019 Youth and Junior Asian Weightlifting Championships demonstrated that the DPRK is on track to continue this success, winning 53 of 174 medals available, finishing 1st on the juniors medal table and winning 43 of 165 youth medals, landing the women’s team on the 1st place and the men’s team on the 3rd. “We think that sports have a unique power to put the whole together. We think that we need to focus on the original goal of sports spirit,” said Korea Weightlifting Federation General Secretary SON Sung Kook. “We are planning to organize the East Asian Weightlifting Championships in March, in Seoul and we will try to invite the DPR Korea Team. DPR Korea is a very strong team not only within East Asian Weightlifting Federation countries but also in the whole world, so we would like to invite them strongly,” he added. “With 193 member nations, we at the International Weightlifting Federation know very well that our sport is one practised all around the world and we are proud to bring so many people together around tests of strength and technique,” said IWF President Tamas Ajan. “But nowhere are we more proud to see weightlifting bringing people together than on the Korean peninsula again, after 2013 Asian Cup brought together Korean athletes competing on the same stage in Pyongyang already. We shall continue to do all that we can to ensure an atmosphere of peaceful celebration through sport continues to open doors and minds wherever we

The Sports Choice Encyclopedia

The Sports Choice Encyclopedia is an English-language international publication promoting the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo and the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympic Games, that was produced in close professional cooperation between the International Olympic Committee and the International Sports Federations. The purpose of this publication is to support an informed choice of sports among young children in Hungary and around the world and the intellectual value of sports culture in sports education through the promotion of Olympic sports. A Hungarian edition will be published on 13 November 2019.   Here we are commemorating the moment when János Nagy, wrestling Olympian, author and editor-in-chief hands over the new edition of the International Sports Choice Encyclopedia to Dr. Tamás Aján, IWF President.

Record entries for the 2019 OTIP Program

The eighth edition of the Oceania Talent Identification Program (OTIP) has reached a record number of 9156 entries from 13 countries this year (5151 boys and 4005 girls)! [caption id="attachment_28367" align="alignleft" width="228"] Solomon Islands[/caption] In 2012, Dr Tamas Ajan, President of the IWF launched the first OTIP program organized by the Oceania Weightlifting Federation with the aim to identify talented students throughout the schools of the Oceania region, and in particular the Pacific Island nations. Thirteen countries took part in the program: Australia, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Niue, Cook Islands, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Nauru, Kiribati, Guam and CNMI. This year, Kiribati's pride lifter, 2019 Pacific Games winner and multiple international champions, KATOATAU David took on the duty to travel around the islands to promote the sport of weightlifting and the OTIP program.  David is well known for his contribution to his community and the common good, he was named as an Oceania National Olympic Committees (ONOC) ambassador for climate change last year.     This OWF school initiative has been the backbone of the development of champions in the Oceania region in recent years. This program organised by the OWF is financially supported by the IWF. Many students who have been identified through the OTIP program by their own federations are now lifting in national and international events including the Commonwealth and Olympic

In memory of Alexander Kurlovich: Alexander Cup 2019

The 2019 Alexander Cup was held between 1-4 November in Grodno, Belarus, in memory of the two-time Olympic champion, four-times World Champion, two-times European Champion and Member of the IWF Technical Committee, Alexander Kurlovich. The Cup, which was also a Silver Level Qualification Event for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games has seen 26 men and 30 women participants from 17 countries all over the world. On the medals table, China won the most by far (24,6,3), Belarus kept home 24 medals (6,10,8) and Ukraine was third with 9 medals (6,3,0).  At the men's teams classification, Belarus took the lead followed by China and Armenia, while the Chinese women's team proved to be the best followed by Belarus and Russia. HUANG TING (CHN) improved her own Junior World Record by two 2kg in the women's 64kg bodyweight category to 107kg in the Snatch and Uzbek FAYZULLAEVA Kumushkhon set a new Snatch Youth World Record in the same category at 98kg. It shows the local importance of the event and the respect towards Alexander Kurlovich, that prior to the competition, the Governor of Grodno received the IWF delegation: Mohammed Jalood, General Secretary; Nicu Vlad, Vice President and Attila Adamfi, Director General. International officials paid tribute at Alexanders grave together with Olga Kurlovich, his widow. In relation to the competition, Attila Adamfi was invited to meet sports leaders and political notabilities of the country in Minsk, including Siarhei Kavalchunk, Sports Minister of Belarus, Yury Senko, Chairman of BWU and Belarus Customs Chairman and George Katulin, Secretary General of the Belarus NOC. The IWF Director General was given an update regarding the improvements and investments in the matter of Anti-Doping in Belarus. In recent years, doping became a criminal action in the country, which, together with education programs, resulted in a doping-free record for Belarus since 2016. Building on the experiences from the second European Games this year in Minsk, Attila Adamfi discussed the possibility of including weightlifting in the programme of the Games next year.