Riyadh, Day 5: Photo Gallery
All photos by Giorgio Scala/Deepbluemedia [gallery size="large"
The two “hats” of Hidilyn Diaz (PHI)
Firstly, there is the athlete. An immense star of weightlifting and a hero in her country, the Philippines. Born in February 1991, Hidilyn Diaz started her international career with a 10th place at the 2008 Olympic Games. Since then, she was also present in London 2012, in Rio 2016 (where she was a silver medallist), and finally at the Tokyo 2020ne rendezvous – gold in the 55kg, with a total of 224kg. With the change in the Olympic categories – the 55kg is now replaced by the 59kg, Diaz had to adapt to this new reality, but we can say that she is quite successful for the time being. After a first 59kg appearance at the 2023 Asian Championships – where she was fourth, with 221kg, her best coming to Riyadh in the Olympic Qualification Ranking – the Philippines’ champion did better in Saudi Arabia, on the fifth day of the IWF World Championships. She was only seventh, but with a higher total of 97-127-224. This means that Diaz continues in the top-10 of the Olympic ranking and has legitimate hopes of competing at her fifth Games, next year in the French capital. “I messed up in the snatch. I could have reached an even better result, but things didn’t go as well as I wanted. I was perhaps overwhelmed by this new category for me… and I inevitably got a bit nervous at the beginning of the competition. Then, things went better towards the end,” confessed a smiling Diaz at the end of her performance. “But OK, I know I have plenty of room for improvement in the upcoming competitions. I am hopeful that I can get close to 230kg”. And her optimism is contagious: “I tell you more – I want to win the gold in Paris!” In view of that, the preparation of her “body, muscles and strength” for the new category has been a “challenge. I got injured, I had some problems, and I even questioned myself if I could do it. I have doubts, but I am definitively happy that I took the decision to continue,” admits the 2022 world champion in the 55kg category. “But I have the ambition to win the Olympics one more time – that is what motivates me on a daily basis. You need to be ambitious – and I am ambitious!” Then, there is the “other side”, the second "hat" of Hidilyn Diaz. Elected to the IWF Athletes Commission, she is also a member of the Executive Board, with full voting rights. More recently, she has been part of the working group in charge of creating the 2024-2032 IWF Strategic Plan, a document to be approved by the IWF Congress this Tuesday in Riyadh. “Yes, sometimes this is more difficult than competing. I am really happy to be involved in the life and decision-making process of the IWF. It’s sometimes a huge responsibility, but a good one. But I chose this way, and my fellow athletes chose me to represent them. It’s a big honour for me,” she says. “Together with the other members of the Athletes Commission, I believe we brought positive changes to the IWF”. Asked about the importance of these new developments, Diaz doesn’t hesitate: “Having athletes on the Board, making proposals, joining the discussions, and voting on relevant matters for the life of our Federation is a huge step forward. Moreover, being involved more recently in the elaboration of a strategic document for the IWF allowed me to share my ideas on how to progress in the long term, how to build up our brand, to engage more with our athletes and fans… All this is quite important for us. Finally, don’t forget I am a woman – I represent women’s weightlifting and I have a say in the development of our sport. This is fundamental for me!” On her expectation concerning the changes caused by the new Strategic Plan, Diaz is clear: “It points out a direction. The new path the IWF must follow in order to succeed – in good governance, in gender equity… in so many other fields. This is a decisive step forward in the life of the IWF and its athletes. It is our duty to accomplish this mission and I am sure we will make it work!” By Pedro Adrega, IWF Communications Photos by Giorgio
Riyadh, Day 5: Luo puts last year’s failure behind her to give China another world title
China’s national anthem was played for the fourth time in four days after Luo Shifang put the disappointment of last year behind her to win a sweep of golds in an exciting women’s 59kg contest at the IWF World Championships in Riyadh. At the 2022 World Championships in Bogotá last December, this was the only women’s Olympic category in which China failed to win a medal on total. Luo Shifang and Luo Xiaomin finished fourth and fifth. This time Luo Xiaomin was replaced by 18-year-old Pei Xinyi, a multiple junior and youth world record holder who won at the non-Olympic weight of 64kg in Bogotá. Pei finished third here on 102-130-232 behind Luo Shifang, who made a six-from-six 107-136-243, and the Ukrainian European champion Kamila Konotop on 106-130-236. Luo Shifang (CHN) Olympic champion Kuo Hsing-Chun from Chinese Taipei lifted in the C Group yesterday and still won a medal, the clean and jerk silver on 130kg, the same number as third-placed Konotop and Pei. Kuo was fourth on total on 231kg, ahead of last year’s winner Yenny Alvarez from Colombia, who made 100-129-229. Another C Group lifter, Rafiatu Lawal from Nigeria, was sixth with a total of 225kg. Asia is the dominant force in weightlifting so was Luo surprised to see so many contenders from Europe, South America, Africa and the United States – Taylor Wilkins was 10th on 220kg – on the scoreboard? “Yes I was a little bit surprised” replied Luo, 22. “But I am confident that I can maintain my dominance. “I am proud of my performance, and very happy that I didn’t let anybody down, that everything went to plan. “You will feel different things on different stages but the main thing that kept me going since last year was the knowledge that I am still young, still improving, gaining in experience and in confidence.” Hidilyn Diaz, the Olympic champion at 55kg who had to move up when that category was dropped for Paris, showed improvement on only her second appearance at 59kg. After winning the world title at 55kg last year Diaz had found the jump in weight difficult to cope with when she made 221kg in finishing fourth at the Asian Championships in Korea in May. Here she improved that total by 3kg and edged ahead of her Philippines team-mate Elreen Ando with a successful final clean and jerk of 127kg. Kuo made 236kg in Tokyo to finish well clear of her rivals. Polina Guryeva won silver for Turkmenistan with 217kg and Mikiko Ando from Japan took bronze on 214kg. Kamila Konotop (UKR) When the rankings are updated a few days after the World Championships finish, 217kg and 214kg will be well down the list. Ando totalled 216kg in Riyadh, better than her Tokyo medal-winning effort but good enough only for 13th place here. The standard in this class has gone way up, and far bigger numbers will be needed for a place on the podium in Paris. Tom Goegebuer, triple Olympian coach of ninth-placed Nina Sterckx and president of the Belgian Weightlifting Federation, said, “Qualifying for the Olympic Games is harder than lifting at the Olympic Games.” The versatile Sterckx made a career-best five-from-six 99-121-220 and is now ranked in the top 10 at both 49kg and 59kg. “It’s the same in the 49s,” said Gorgebuer. “It’s harder to qualify because there are fewer Olympic places available than last time, not so many weight classes, and people take more risks.” Pei Xinyi (CHN) Those risks are paying off enough times for the top 20 to be a far higher standard than before. “If the qualifying system was the same as last time, three periods and an average from the three best results in those periods, Nina would not be going for these numbers.” There was another sea of red in the B Group, in which none of the 11 athletes managed to better the top three in the C Group – Kuo, Lawal and her Nigeria team-mate Adijat Olarinoye. Madagascar finished off its most successful World Championships to date when Tojo Andriatsitohaina made a huge jump in the Olympic rankings in the men’s 73kg D Group, from 35th place to 12th. Like his three team-mates “Tojo”, as Andriatsitohaina is known, made a big improvement to his career-best total, finishing 153-178-331. He had never competed before at this weight in an IWF competition, having posted his previous qualifying best of 300kg at 67kg. A 153kg snatch won bronze in last year’s IWF World Championships and if things go his way in the other sessions on Saturday, Tojo might win make the podium from the D Group. That would be a fourth medal for the team. Rosina Randafiarison had a sweep of silvers in the women’s 45kg, the best performance at a World Championships in any Olympic sport by a Malagasy athlete. All four team members in Riyadh won a sweep of golds at the Indian Ocean Island Games in their home nation less than two weeks ago, two of them with bigger totals than they made here. And all four prepared for their Island Games-World Championships double header by working hard at a four-month training camp in China. Madagascar has been sending dozens of athletes from five sports to training camps in China since 2017 – disrupted for a couple of years by Covid - and the results are clearly paying off. “What we learned most while we were there was discipline,” said Tojo’s brother Eric, who has turned to coaching after his career was ended by injury. “Everybody has benefited from the training camp, and the rest of the world should take notice and start worrying about Madagascar. Here we come.” By Brian Oliver, Inside the Games Photos by Giorgio
Riyadh, Day 4: Photo Gallery
All photos by Giorgio Scala/Deepbluemedia [gallery size="large"
Riyadh, Day 4: Chen prospers for China while others fail – and Irawan takes silver from B Group
China won gold for the third day in a row when Chen Lijun finished well ahead of everybody else in the men’s 67kg at the IWF World Championships in Riyadh. Chen made five from five for 153-180-333 and declined his final attempt. Meanwhile everybody else saw red lights – 40 of them compared to 20 whites between the 10 other lifters, none of whom made more than three from six. Chen Lijun (CHN) Three failed to make a total, Chen’s team-mate He Yueji and Ferdi Hardal from Turkey in the snatch, and Goga Chkheidze from Georgia in clean and jerk. That left the way clear for the Indonesian Eko Yuli Irawan to finish second from the B Group on 146-175-321, clear of third-placed Gor Sahakyan by 9kg. Defending world champion Francisco Mosquera from Colombia was fourth on total, making 135-176-311 from his two good lifts. He took silver in clean and jerk, ahead of the Korean Lee Sangyeon also on 176kg after a 130kg snatch. Francisco Mosquera (COL) Irawan, who is on course to become the first weightlifter in history to win a medal at five Olympic Games, equalled his career-best total at this weight in the B Group. He looked very pleased with his 146-175-321, the same total he made in winning at the IWF Grand Prix in Cuba in June. It might have been even better for Irawan, who missed his final attempt in the snatch at 150kg after making a career-best 146kg, and also failed with his final clean and jerk at 181kg. The Armenian 20-year-old Sahakyan, who won the European title in his homeland in April on 320kg, was third behind Chen and Irawan in snatch and finished 142-170-312. Gor Sahakyan (ARM) An Olympic gold medallist and an African champion added a touch of quality to the earlier women’s 55kg C Group. Kuo Hsing-Chun from Chinese Taipei made a six-from-six 101-130-231 and could become the second C Group medallist of the week here, after Aniq Kasdan achieved the feat in the men’s 61kg. Kuo was well short of her world records – she holds all three at this weight – but was more than pleased with her performance after her preparations were disrupted by injury. Asked if it was her first career win in a C Group, five-times world champion Kuo laughed and explained why she had made such a low entry total of 210kg. “I have been injured and was not doing much training two months ago. “I got up to 90 in snatch and 120 in clean and jerk and I told my coach I should open lower here. “It worked, because today’s performance was great, my first six-from-six this year. I’m very happy. “I will be working really hard in the next few weeks before I go to Hangzhou.” Lee Sangyeon (KOR) That will be for the Asian Games, where weightlifting starts on September 30. Kuo won in the old 58kg category at the last Asian Games in Indonesia. Kuo’s 231kg was only 1kg lower than her best effort in qualifying for Paris 2024, despite her recent fitness problems. Two other totals in the C Group were high enough to make the top 10 in qualifying, Rafiatu Lawal’s 100-125-225 and Anyelin Venegas’s 95-124-219. The Nigerian Lawal sped through her lifts, missing only the last one and improving by 8kg her career best, which she had set in winning the African title in May. It was still not enough for Lawal and she was almost in tears as she left the platform after missing her final attempt. “I wanted more,” she said. “I’ve improved my clean and jerk and I know I can do better.” Lawal had trained hard alongside her team-mate Adijat Olarinoye, who also lifted in the C Group and made a career best 95-120-215. Both won Commonwealth Games gold last year, Lawal at 59kg and Olarinoye at 55kg. “They push each other in training, they are both hungry to qualify,” said coach Aduche Ojadi, a double Olympian. Venegas, from Venezuela, had made totals between 208kg and 212kg in all of her seven competitions in the past four years but this time she was much higher on 219kg despite missing three times. That would have put her ninth in qualifying, although with two sessions to come there will be plenty more changes. The rankings will be updated a few days after the end of these Championships. By Brian Oliver, Inside the Games Photos by Giorgio
Irawan (INA) is ready for a fifth Olympic medal!
At 34, Eko Yuli Irawan is an Indonesian hero and for sure one of the most successful lifters in history. He has no Olympic gold, but one medal in each of the four Games he entered. If he qualifies for Paris (it won’t be very difficult in his case), and if he reaches the podium in the French capital, he will be the only athlete in this sport to have medalled in five editions of the Olympic showcase. On the fourth day of the IWF World Championships in Riyadh, Irawan, competing in the 67kg, was largely better than the rest of the field in the… B session. With a total of 146-175-321 (equalling his personal best in this category), he ended up getting two silver medals in this event (snatch and total). Irawan started his international career in 2006, when he got the silver at the IWF World Junior Championships, in the 56kg category. His total at the time: 269kg. He progressed quite quickly, and two years later, at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing (CHN), he got the bronze in 288kg. And the achievements go on, with successful appearances in London 2012 (also third, with 317kg, this time in the 62kg), Rio 2016 (silver, 312kg), and Tokyo 2020ne (runner-up in the 61kg, with 302kg). Between these highlights, the Indonesian lifter has also amassed several medals at the World and continental level. At the IWF showcase, his only victory came in 2018, when he lifted 143-174-317 in the 61kg. Going to Paris, Irawan appears twice in the Olympic ranking, both in the 61kg and 67kg category. He is clearly best in the lighter one – his “natural” weight –, where he is the third best so far (300kg, from his silver performance at the IWF Worlds in Bogota), after China’s Li (314kg) and Italy’s Massidda (302kg, at yesterday’s final of the event in Riyadh). In the 67kg, he equalled his best of 321kg, which is clearly not enough to guarantee the presence in the top-10 (the cut is at 332kg). After his final lift in Saudi Arabia, he was obviously satisfied with the outcome, but clarified that he will be back to the 61kg category, most “probably in time for the IWF Grand Prix in Qatar, in December”. On the competition in Saudi Arabia, Irawan “enjoyed it a lot. All the conditions are perfect, the organisation is very good and the athletes feel comfortable here”. On the Olympic prospects, he is also optimistic: “I’ll of course go for the 61kg. I think the qualification is guaranteed. If I can lift 310-315 in Paris, I think I have many chances of getting a medal. It would be quite amazing and incredible. I am working hard to reach the right level and all indicators are positive. The preparation is going quite well and we remain optimistic,” he declares. Suffering from a “minor problem” in his left knee, the Indonesian star confessed that his last clean and jerk attempt at 181kg “was a bit too much – it proved too heavy for my physical condition today”. After this short interview, he came back, a couple of hours later, to the podium, after the conclusion of the A session – to collect two more medals for his outstanding collection! And the story is far from being over. By Pedro Adrega, IWF Communications Photos by Giorgio
