News

FIGUEROA MOSQUERA raises bar for Colombia

By Brian Oliver at Riocentro, Rio de Janeiro Thailand’s women and the tearful Colombian Oscar Figueroa were the heroes of an emotional, exciting third day of competition at the Riocentro arena. Figueroa, cheered on by hundreds of noisy fans, won 62kg gold in the evening ahead of Indonesia’s Eko Yuli Irawan and Kazakhstan’s Farkhad Kharki. Irawan, after bronzes at Beijing and London, will return for more at Tokyo 2020, by when Figueroa, 33, is likely to have retired. Irawan, 27, said, “Silver is an improvement for me, but I know I can do better yet.” Figueroa, a silver medallist in London, broke down in tears at the finish and kept crying for five minutes. “It was as if I was lifting for the whole of Colombia,” he said. Thailand's women made it two golds and one silver from three attempts and will aim for another medal on Tuesday when their fourth and final female team member competes in the 63kg. They have been helped by the exclusion of doping cheats from other countries, but the driving force behind their success is a woman who treats the weightlifters as her own children and has negotiated lucrative sponsorship deals to fund a national performance centre and keep them in full-time training. After Sopita Tanasan’s victory in the 48kg, the opening contest of the Rio Games, Thailand followed up with a one-two in the 58kg. Sukanya Srisurat won from Pimsiri Sirikaew, with Kuo Hsing-Chun of Taipei taking the bronze. Both medallists attributed Thailand’s success to Boossaba Yodbangtoey, the president of the Thai Amateur Weightlifting Association (Tawa) whose husband, Intarat, is vice-president of Thailand’s Olympic committee and of the International Weightlifting Federation. Thailand has won five gold medals in weightlifting, all by women. They have five men in Rio but none is expected to challenge for gold. When Boossaba was asked why there was such a disparity between men and women she said, “Because the men are like teenagers, on the edge and hard to control. They want to go out and we have to get security to watch them at our training camp! “The women are mostly from poor families and they all work hard. I am so proud of them. Maybe we can win another medal tomorrow.” Siripuch Gulnoi is their final female competitor, in the 63kg. Srisurat had tested positive at a youth event just after her 16th birthday and served a two-year ban. When asked why she had doped she said she had not made the decision herself, was too young to know what she was taking and had returned to the sport as a clean athlete “because I never give up”. Boossaba said, “I have no children of my own so these girls are like my own children. I would never do anything to harm them. They have all been tested many times before coming to Rio.” Boossaba said Srisurat’s doping offence was caused by her club, not the national association. Srisurat was one of seven Thai teenagers who tested positive at youth events in 2011. There have been no positives since then. Tawa is backed by the national electricity authority for 16m bhat (about $480,000) a year for the four-year Olympic cycle. “We don’t have government support,” said Boossaba. “The power authority is our main sponsor and we have other supporters from the private sector. “I have never been a weightlifter myself – I’m management! We have a very good training centre in Chiang Mai.” The state does provide Olympic medallists with big rewards, and Srisurat will be given about 12million bhat, said Boossaba (about $330,000). “She will be rich!” There was a good performance in 11th place behind Srisurat, on 199kg, by the Marshall Islands’ first weightlifter to compete at the Olympics, 19-year-old Mathlynn Sasser. ‘Mattie’ is one of seven Marshallese children adopted by Terry Sasser and his wife Amy. Mattie, who was a good sprinter before she took up weightlifting, carried the flag at the opening ceremony. “I was so proud of that, and I enjoyed this experience,” she said. “Now there are some decisions to be made.” She has dual nationality as Terry holds an American passport as well as being Marshallese. She may go to the US to further her training. Had she been competing for the US she would have broken three national junior records in Rio. Thailand’s bronze medallist in the men’s 56kg, Sinphet Kruaithong, was unable to celebrate when he heard that his 84-year-old grandmother had died of a suspected heart attack while watching him on

Records tumble as Long beats Om at last

By Brian Oliver at Riocentre, Rio de Janeiro China suffered a rare failure in the women’s 53kg but more than made up for it when Long Qingquan broke the oldest total world record in weightlifting to beat PRK’s Om Yun-Chol in a sensational night session at Riocentro. A noisy crowd jumped and cheered as Om made his final attempt at 169kg to break the clean & jerk record at 56kg and take the lead from Long. They roared even louder when Long, the 2008 Olympic champion, hoisted 170kg with the final lift of the night to take the gold medal. He became the first weightlifter, male or female, to win titles eight years apart. Long joined Om in the elite group of seven menwho have lifted three times their own bodyweight. He beat Halil Mutlu’s world record of 305kg set at Sydney 2000 – the oldest world record for a total, having been set 10 days before Hossein Reza Zadeh’s +105kg best. Long, who totalled 307kg, also became the only man to defeat Om since the 2012 Olympic Games. After winning in London four years ago, Om had competed in seven major competitions, including three IWF World Championships, and won them all. Long, at 25 a year older than Om, had finished behind him four times. Long and Om are the only weightlifters currently able to lift three times what they weigh, and the only Asians ever to have done it. Asked if this made them the world’s strongest men Long said, “Among human being yes, we are the strongest. But not in the animal kingdom – remember how strong an ant is!” Om, smiling despite his defeat, said, “The strongest man is the one sitting next to me. I congratulate him.” Thach Kim Tuan of Vietnm had stood below Om on the podium five times and was expected to take the bronze medal, but he failed with all three clean & jerk attempts. That let in the 20-year-old Thai Kruaithong Sinphet for third place, 18kg behind Long. Four records were set in all – Long’s world and Olympic total of 307kg, his Olympic best of 170kg in the clean & jerk, and just before that Om’s 169kg Olympic best clean & jerk. In the women’s 53kg earlier, Hsu Shu-ching won a gold medal for Taipei and consigned China to a humbling defeat. She also earned a lot of prize money in the process. Hsu finished second at London 2012 but the winner, Zulfiya Chinshanlo, tested positive in a recent reanalysis of samples and is supended. Although Chinshanlo is Chinese she switched nationality to Kazakhstan, the nation with the worst doping record in weightlifting in recent years. Her title is likely to be taken from her when the legal process is complete and Hsu will be promoted to first place. “I hope that happens soon, and the silver turns to gold,” she said. Taipei rewards its Olympic medallists well and the promotion would earn Hsu about $140,000. The prize for winning in Rio would take her total Olympic earnings to around $700,000. “If I get this money it will be my pension for life, and I will give some to my family,” she said. Hsu, 25, had expected a strong challenge from China’s Li Yajun but it never happened. Li missed all three clean & jerk attempts and became only the second Chinese female weightlifter ever to fail to register a total. The first, Zhou Jun in London four years ago, was also a 53kg athlete. Hsu had suffered a string of serious injuries and did not compete for two years after the London Games. She had a cervical herniated disc, a leg injury and tendinitis. She knows plenty about injuries, as she is about to graduate in sports medicine. Because of Li’s failure Hidilyn Diaz moved from fifth after the snatch to second overall, winning a first weightlifting medal for the Philippines. Yoon Jin Hee of Korea took the bronze, but it might have gone to the 18-year-old Latvian Rebekah Koha. On her first snatch attempt Koha’s coach changed her weight by 2kg, but the clock restarted with 35seconds to go and Koha was timed out. She then made two good lifts and looked capable of more – and finished only 2kg behind Yoon. “I could have been third, but everyone is happy for me,” said Koha, whose next big championship will be the European Juniors in Israel in December. “I have learned that I must be calm and

First Olympic Champion crowned at Rio 2016

RIO DAY 1 By Brian Oliver at Riocentro, Rio de Janeiro Thailand’s Sopita Tanasan is from a family of boxers but she opted for a different sport and it paid off when she won the first weightlifting gold medal of the Rio Games, the women’s 48kg. Tanasan, 21, lifted a total of 200kg to finish 8kg clear of Indonesia’s Sri Wahyuni Agustiani, who failed with her final attempt at 115kg. Japan’s Hiromi Miyake, competing in her fourth Games, won the bronze. Thailand has won gold medals in only two sports, boxing and weightlifting. The boxing medals were all won by men and after Tanasan’s win on her Olympic debut they now have four in women’s weightlifting. “I am from a boxing family, and there was no weightlifting at my school, but I liked weightlifting and I trained with my older sister,” she said. Her father represented Thailand as an international and her grandfather was also a boxer. If Agustiani had made her 115kg clean & jerk she would have won, but it was too much. It was a nervy time for Tanasan, though she said, “I was always confident.” The silver medal for Agustiani equalled Indonesia’s best weightlifting performance at the Olympics. There was a record for the American Morghan King, who finished sixth. Her snatch of 83kg beat her  national record, which was set by Tara Nott when she won gold at Sydney 2000. China had the early favourite for the contest in Hou Zhihui, who lifted 210kg in her national championships in April, but sent her home from their training camp in Sao Paulo last week when they decided they had a better chance in the +75kg. Hou injured her knee in July and although she was making a recovery Wang Guoxin, head coach of China’s women’s team, opted instead to send for Meng Suping. He said the decision was influenced by Hou’s fitness and also by Russia’s ban from Rio for “bringing the sport into disrepute” with their doping record. Once that ban was confirmed it meant that the favourite in the +75kg, Tatiana Kashirina, would not compete. “Yes, Kashirina's absence did give us a big opportunity to win in this division, because only Meng and Kashirina have the ability to lift over 300kg in total,” Wang told Xinhua news agency. Meng arrived in Rio on Saturday. Another of Tanasan’s strongest rivals, Vietnam’s Thi Huyen Vuong, failed to register a total after three failures in the snatch. Margarita Yelisseyeva, of Kazakhstan, had finished 8kg behind Tanasan in the 53kg at the 2015 IWF World Championships but this time she was 14kg behind in fifth place. Miyake, the oldest of the 12 competitors at 30, had suffered a back injury three months ago. She did well to win a medal and said, “That was tough for me.” When asked if she would attempt a fifth Olympic appearance in her homeland at Tokyo 2020, Miyake said, “I want to enjoy this medal first, and I will think about that when I return

Japan Weightlifting Federation President elected Governor of Tokyo

Japanese Weightlifting Federation President Yuriko Koike has been elected the first female Governor of Tokyo today. Koike, who has previously served as Japan's first female Defence Minister, beat Liberal Democratic Party candidate Hiroya Masuda and journalist Shuntaro Torigue. Koike, 64, will now play a key role in orchestrating preparations for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games. “I would like to implement new policies that no one has ever seen,” she said when on the cusp of victory. One of her first duties will be to receive the Olympic flag from Rio Mayor Eduardo Paes at the Closing Ceremony here on August 21. Koike said she hopes to use the Olympics “as a chance to build for a new Tokyo beyond

IWF EB decision on Russian participation at the Rio 2016 OG

The IWF Executive Board decided today to ban the Russian Weightlifting Federation from recommending/entering/participating with athletes and Technical Official at Rio Olympic Games 2016. The decision is effective as of today. The IWF Executive Board carefully studied question of the participation of Russian weightlifters in the Olympic Games Rio. The study included the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA)’s Independent Person (IP) Report by Prof. Richard McLaren, IOC decision concerning the participation of Russian athletes in the Olympic Games in Rio 2016, Statistics (Re-analytical cases from the Beijing and London Olympic Games), Anti-Doping statistics concerning the Russian athletes, IWF Anti-Doping Policy, WADA Code, Olympic Charter, IOC, WADA communications According to the IOC decision concerning the participation of Russian athletes in the Olympic Games in Rio 2016, which set the eligibility criteria for the Russian athletes to participate at the Games the IWF Executive Board evaluated the nominated athletes’ eligibility. 8 (Eight) athletes were nominated by the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) to compete in the Rio Olympic Games weightlifting events. Ms. Tatiana Kashirina’s and Ms. Anastasiia Romanova’s nominations were withdrawn by the ROC due to prior anti-doping rule violations. Four (4) additional athletes were listed in the McLaren Report as beneficiaries of the Disappearing Positive Methodology System. According to the IOC decision “the IFs to examine the information contained in the IP Report and for such purpose seek from WADA the names of athletes and National Federations (NFs) implicated. Nobody implicated, be it an athlete, an official, or an NF, may be accepted for entry or accreditation for the Olympic Games.” The implication of athletes in the IP Report has been made ineligibility criteria by the IOC; no further action or decision is required from the IWF in this regard. Furthermore, according to the latest IOC decision: “Under these exceptional circumstances, Russian athletes in any of the 28 Olympic summer sports have to assume the consequences of what amounts to a collective responsibility in order to protect the credibility of the Olympic competitions, and the “presumption of innocence” cannot be applied to them. On the other hand, according to the rules of natural justice, individual justice, to which every human being is entitled, has to be applied. This means that each affected athlete must be given the opportunity to rebut the applicability of collective responsibility in his or her individual case.” Further to the above, we would like to highlight the extremely shocking and disappointing statistics regarding the Russian weightlifters: As of today there are 7 confirmed AAFs for Russian weightlifters from the combined reanalysis process of London and Beijing, while the second wave of Beijing reanalyses is not yet in a stage when the names and countries involved can be publicly disclosed. The IOC asked the International Federations to “apply their respective rules in relation to the sanctioning of entire NFs. “ According to Article 12.4 of the IWF Anti-Doping Policy, „If any Member Federation or members or officials thereof, by reason of conduct connected with or associated with doping or anti-doping rule violations, brings the sport of weightlifting into disrepute, the IWF Executive Board may, in its discretion, take such action as it deems fit to protect the reputation and integrity of the sport.“ The IWF Executive Board confirmed that the Russian Weightlifting Federation and Russian weightlifters brought the weightlifting sport into disrepute. In the light of the above, the Executive Board decided to withdraw the appointment of the Russian Technical Official from the Rio2016 Olympic Games. The integrity of the weightlifting sport has been seriously damaged on multiple times and levels by the Russians, therefore an appropriate sanction was applied in order to preserve the status of the sport. According to the Reallocation Policy, the Executive Board decided to offer the available Quota place to athletes from the following NOCs: Women ALB, GEO, MDA Men BEL, CRO, ESA, MGL, SRB All athletes beneficiating from this last minute Reallocation were tested in the Qualification Period and are subject to further testing before

PUBLIC DISCLOSURES

The IWF reports that as a consequence of the IOC’s reanalyses of samples from the 2012 London Olympic Games (IOC - wave 2), the samples of the following Athletes have returned Adverse Analytical Findings: ZAIROV, Intigam (AZE) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone (S1.1 Anabolic agents) ZABOLOTNAYA, Nataliya (RUS) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone (S1.1 Anabolic agents) TSIREKIDZE, Rauli (GEO) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone, Stanozolol (S1.1 Anabolic agents) UTESHOV, Almas (KAZ) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone, Stanozolol (S1.1 Anabolic agents) TZARUKAEVA, Svetlana (RUS) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone (S1.1 Anabolic agents) SIMSEK, Sibel (TUR) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone, Stanozolol (S1.1 Anabolic agents) KULESHA, Iryna (BLR) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone, Stanozolol (S1.1 Anabolic agents) KHURSHUDYAN, Hripsime (ARM) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone, Stanozolol (S1.1 Anabolic agents) IVANOV, Alexandr (RUS) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone (S1.1 Anabolic agents), Tamoxifen (S4. Hormone and metabolic modulators) IOVU, Cristina (MDA) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone (S1.1 Anabolic agents) DEMANOV, Andrey (RUS) - Dehydrochlormethyltestosterone (S1.1 Anabolic agents) In line with the relevant rules and regulations, the IWF imposed mandatory provisional suspensions upon the Athletes, who remain provisionally suspended in view of potential anti-doping rule violations until their cases are closed. Following the IOC’s decisions, the IWF will be in a position to take over the results management of these cases. Should it be determined in any of the cases that no anti-doping violation was committed, the relevant decision shall also be published. The IWF will not make any further comments on the cases until they are