News

Don’t miss the Anti-Doping Education Seminar in Riyadh!

Less than a week before the start of the IWF World Championships, our International Federation is delighted to be partnering with the International Testing Agency (ITA) at the 2023 IWF World Championships in Riyadh (KSA) to deliver an Anti-Doping Education Seminar, taking place on September 9, at 10am (exact location to be confirmed). An ITA Education Ambassador, two times Olympic medallist from Canada, Ms. Christine Girard will deliver a presentation for all interested about clean sport. Moreover, all participants will leave with a nice surprise gift! Finally, an IWF/ITA Information Booth will be available at the venue from September 9-11 for all those who would like to take part in interesting anti-doping activities! Bring your team and friends and come to learn more about our ILiftClean programme! Quizzes, useful information and practical tips are provided to all lifters and support personnel, giving in a very pedagogic way very useful insights on our anti-doping rules and procedures. A similar initiative was successfully held last March, on the occasion of the IWF World Youth Championships in Durres (ALB). Back then, many young athletes filled the room of the Seminar and made a stop at the informative booth. The 2023 IWF World Championships will be held in Saudi Arabia, from September 4-17, gathering around 700 competitors from 120 nations. It is the most important IWF event of the year and it also constitutes a qualification opportunity for the 2024 Olympic Games in

“Weightlifting Changed my Life”: A lesson of life in Honduras and in Jordan! 

It is often said that sport can be a tool for social success, or even more importantly a way of changing the lives of those practicing it. This is already a nice declaration on paper, but it becomes really interesting when concrete examples of the positive change sport may bring to the athletes are shown. Through an inspiring video – “Weightlifting Changed my Life” – the IWF went to Honduras and Jordan to talk about these young competitors, who saw their lives transformed thanks to their passion for the sport.   In the streets of Tegucigalpa, and in some of the most marginalised neighbourhoods of the Honduran capital, Axel Pavon, Emelin Ortiz, Jorge Hernandez, and Sofia Aleman tell us about their existences before and after weightlifting entered into their lives. Influenced by family or friends, they all underline the powerful impact the sport brought to their existence.   “This sport helped me a lot as it prevented me from going down the wrong path. It also made me a more mature and tougher person,” considers Ortiz, who had also fought against the discrimination against women in weightlifting. Aleman also had a “bumpy road, but it was sure worth it!” In her case, weightlifting decisively helped her overcome a serious depression episode. “It literally saved my life”.   Pavon talks about the power of the sport as a “ray of hope for many people at social risk”, while Hernandez is an athlete, but works at the same time in his own house construction company. “I come from a poor environment, but I didn’t want to remain like that. I wanted to have a better life than the ones my parents experienced. I refused the status of ‘being poor’ for my entire life. Weightlifting was essential in this process.”   On the other side of the planet, in Amman, weightlifting had also a major importance in the lives of many young athletes. Adlah Hasonh, sisters Rama and Rahima Hijazi, and Weam Qandeel are four female athletes that had to overcome the stigmatisation of the sport for women and are today promising talents in Jordan’s national team.   “I didn’t like the sport in the beginning, but when I started competing, I fell in love with it!” confesses Qandeel. “I know that through our example, we are a role model for some people,” she adds. The Hijazi siblings agree that weightlifting reinforced their confidence, while their mother Rania confesses: “I had to research about the effects of the sport on the woman’s body. And it soon became evident that there was absolutely no risk to their health. Today, I encourage my daughters and I am happy with their evolution.”   In Al-Manara, Asem and Raad Alsallaj are brothers and also share a passion for weightlifting. “It’s a family business, our father was a lifter, and we are trained by our uncle. Our destiny was to be in this sport. But we love it and we support each other.”   Get inspired by these examples of devotion and discover the power of weightlifting in the lives of these young athletes! Enjoy our video

Three days more for Verification of Final Entries for Riyadh 2023!

IWF Member Federations entered for the 2023 IWF World Championships have until this Monday, August 21, at 12h00 (noon) CET to proceed to the verification of their final entries, submitted by July 4, 2023. In this last step before the participation of their teams in Riyadh (KSA), National Member Federations may confirm or delete the participation of their athletes, but they can also choose the option “Only Weigh-in”. This possibility was introduced to ensure that the list of athletes announced after the verification of final entries corresponds to the number of lifters effectively competing in A sessions. This relates with the importance of the IWF World Championships and the associated TV exposure and visibility of those sessions. The idea is to minimise the eventual time differences between what is programmed and scheduled for TV purposes and what is the real duration of each A session. After the August 21 deadline for verification of final entries, no further changes can be made to the data submitted by the IWF Member Federations. This procedure can be made through the IWF E-Entry System (link

Improving the level in Myanmar

The Myanmar Weightlifting Federation (MWF) recently organised, with the support of the IWF and Olympic Solidarity, a five-day course for national coaches and ITO’s, at the Multi-Purpose Hall in Nay Pyi Taw. More than 20 officials were able to get updated on technical relevant information concerning weightlifting, in a course lectured by Ms Aphinya Dattuyawat, from Thailand, former Asian champion and Olympian. He was assisted by Mr Myo Min (MYA), MWF Deputy Secretary General, Mr Htet Wai (MYA), Deputy Director for the Sports and Physical Education department in charge of Myanmar Anti-Doping Agency, and by Ms Ei Ei Mon (MYA), Assistant Director for Sports and Physical Education and International Relations of the Myanmar National Olympic Committee.   After an Opening Ceremony led by the President of the Myanmar NOC, Mr U Min Thein Zan, all participants took part in theoretical and practical sessions, focusing on several areas: safety, basic training, competition readiness, event rules and regulations, refereeing, video playback technology, psychology and anti-doping education.   According to the MWF, the course – held from August 7-11 – was a “complete success” and was well received by all coaches and officials. The workshop sessions, where the level of exchange of information and experience was higher, were particularly appreciated. Finally, all participants were able to pass with distinction (with an average of over 90%) the theory exam at the end of the course.     “The MWF would like to thank the IWF, the IOC Olympic Solidarity, the Myanmar Olympic Committee, and the Thai Weightlifting Federation for their valuable support in developing a new generation of coaches and officials in our country, thus creating better conditions for the lifters in the

IWF at the Paris 2024 Weightlifting Operational Test Event

Paris 2024 Weightlifting Operational Test Event was held at the South Paris Arena 6 on Saturday 12 August 2023. Comprising of men’s +102kg and women’s 71kg, twenty-five (25) French lifters in total competed across the two bodyweight categories. The event was hailed as a success as the Organising Committee was able to successfully validate planning objectives such as testing the venue transition, field of play, warm up area, sport equipment, national technical officials, sport specific volunteers, and timing, scoring and results. Matthew Curtain, IWF Executive Board Member and IF Delegate, as well as Moira Lassen, IF Delegate said they were very pleased to see things run smoothly.  The competition also gave all weightlifters and officials the chance to experience being associated within the dynamics of an Olympic environment and so it was certainly a great event for everyone involved. IWF President Mohammed Jalood, IWF Executive Board Member and Technical Committee Chair Sam Coffa, IWF Executive Board Member and Medical Committee Chair Faithi Masmoudi, IWF Executive Board Member Boukar Tikire and FFHM President Michel Raynaud were

Successful urban weightlifting event at the EYOF in Maribor (SLO)

Following the second edition of the “Swiss Street Weightlifting”, held in early July in the Olympic capital Lausanne (SUI), the urban version of the sport was again in evidence at the start of the European Youth Olympic Festival (EYOF), running from July 23-29 in the historical Slovenian city of Maribor. Besides the 11 official sports on the programme, weightlifting made a very successful demonstration event, gathering 16 athletes from seven nations, in a mixed-gender international team and individual competition format. Each team was composed from one boy and one girl from different countries. This initiative generated a lot of success and enthusiasm among the participants and certainly constitutes and important step forward in the implementation of new popular events within the weightlifting programme. Speaking to Inside the Games, Antonio Conflitti, President of the European Weightlifting Federation and IWF Executive Board member, was a happy man with the event: “People would say they could just stop by and watch for five minutes, but they ended up staying for one and a half hours and they really enjoyed it. We told the athletes, ‘we are writing a new chapter of weightlifting history and you are the protagonists - enjoy the moment'. They did that, and some of them said they were so relaxed in the environment they had better results than at the European Youth Championships in Moldova two weeks ago.” The IWF’s Vice-President Attila Adamfi was also in Maribor and praised the organisation of this urban weightlifting demonstration: “Since the IWF organised the first international Street Weightlifting event in Lausanne, in 2022, more and more such events are held around the world. Recently, Lausanne organised the second edition already, a demonstration was held in June in Havana, Cuba, and now this superb event in Slovenia. Jamaica and the European Weightlifting Federation in Olympia (GRE) are also planning to host urban weightlifting events where our sport is delivered to the spectators in a new format.” Both IWF officials are members of the Working Group coordinating the creation of the first-ever Strategic Plan for our International Federation. On this roadmap for the period 2024-2032, the implementation of new events and innovative formats in the sport is clearly a priority. “All these events provide great experience that shall be collected and evaluated. As part of our strategic objective to introduce new, innovative disciplines, a consolidated 'urban weightlifting' format shall be elaborated soon, with the active participation of the Athletes,” Mr Adamfi says. Antonio Conflitti, Laszlo Fabian (General Secretary of Hungary's NOC) and Attila Adamfi  Mr Conflitti goes in the same direction: “We need to make weightlifting more attractive to a wider audience and these events help to do that.” Competition-wise, lifters from Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Malta, Serbia, Slovakia and Slovenia were in action in Maribor. Team winners were Gabriela Frlan (CRO) and Gabor Bunasz (HUN), while individual best performances went to Janez Paternoster (SLO) among boys, and to Chiara Reljac (CRO) in the girls’