4th WUC Weightlifting – Opening and First Day of Competition

CHIANG MAI – The 4^th World University Weightlifting Championship kicked-off on 5 December, an important day for the Thai nation. Indeed 5 December is Thailand’s king’s birthday and on this special occasion a crowd all dressed of yellow – the king’s colour – could support the best weightlifters in the women’s 48kg and 53kg categories as well as men’s 56 and 62kg.

In the women’s 48kg, the snatch competition was clearly dominated by the local athlete Panida Khamsri who started her competition with a 73kg attempt, followed by two successful lifts (75 and 77kg). Her closest opponent, Hacer Demirel (TUR) grabbed the snatch silver with a 72kg barbell while Mizuki Yanagida took the bronze of the discipline with a 71kg lift.

Khamsri (THA), a bronze World Championship medallist in 2014 and silver medallist in 2011, but also a bronze medallist in the 2013 Universiade made an even bigger impression in the clean and jerk competition starting seventeen kilos over her fellow competitors. With a 105kg lift achieved Khamsri takes the gold ahead of Yanagida (JPN – 90kg) and Demirel (TUR – 89kg). Khamsri winning both the snatch and clean and jerk competition obviously won the overall gold medal with a total of 182kg. Yanagida (161kg) and Demirel (161kg) won respectively silver and bronze.

Further to this first competition, the Opening Ceremony of the 4^th WUC Weightlifting took place in the presence of the Chiang Mai governor who declared the championship open as well as Leonz Eder, FISU Vice-President. The University Sports Board of Thailand was also represented by its president as well as the Thai Amateur Weightlifting Association.

The next competition of the day was the women’s 53kg category. In this competition featuring 11 competitors, the fight for medals was much tighter than in the previous event. In Snatch, Sutanan (THA) took the gold with 86kg ahead of Dos Reis Santos (BRA), 82kg and Xu Li (CHN) 80kg. Sutanan, bronze medallist of the 2013 IWF World Championship, 2013 Universiade silver medallist and 2012 WUC silver medallist could count on the crowd to help her.

 In the clean and jerk event, Sutanan could demonstrate her strength once again winning another gold medal (110kg) beating Coban (TUR), 110kg but a higher bodyweight and Golovanova (RUS), 102kg. In the total, Sutanan obviously won the sixth gold medal of the day for Thailand with a total of 196kg ahead of Coban (TUR), the reigning European champion with 187kg and Dos Reis Santos (BRA), 177kg completing a three-continent podium.

The day ended with two men events. In the 56kg Tang Wei (CHN) took the gold medal with 110kg ahead of Mingmoon (THA), 109kg and Tan chi-Chung (TPE) the 2012 World University Champion with a barbell of 105kg. The clean and jerk competition gave the opportunity to Mingmoon (THA) to bring one more title to Thailand with a 139kg lift while Tan (TPE) and Tang (CHN) respectively took silver and bronze with 136kg and 130kg. In the total, same ranking Mingmoon (248kg) ahead of Tan (241kg) and Tang (240kg).

In the men’s 62kg snatch competition, another Chinese won the gold medal, Yu (130kg) letting no chance to Phonchiangsa from Thailand (121kg) and Kao (TPE) with 115kg. In the clean and jerk competition Yu took the gold with 155kg followed by Phonchiangsa (151kg) and Hara (JPN) with 147kg. In the total Yu took his third gold medal of the day with 285kg followed by Phonchiongsa (272kg) and Kao (261kg).

(Source: Julien Buhajezuk, WUC Dept.)

Livestreaming

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Results

Find the results here.