León, Day 9: Sarria widens medal spread with gold for Cuba – and Love claims Canada’s first world record in 70 years
The 2024 World Junior Championships ended with super-heavyweight victories for Cuba in the women and Korea in the men, and a first world record for Canada since the 1950s.
Marifelix Sarria became Cuba’s first ever junior world champion when she made all six lifts for a wide-margin success. Sarria, 20 last month, improved her best total by 20kg in making 115-155-270.
Cuba became the 14th team to win a title. Like last year, United States topped the final medals table, which once more included a wide spread of nations.
Marifelix Sarria (CUB)
Of the 62 teams taking part in León, Spain – 60 nations plus the Individual Neutral Athletes from Belarus and the Weightlifting Refugee Team – 34 won at least one medal on the extended table featuring snatch, clean and jerk and total. The latest additions on the final day were Cuba, New Zealand and Poland.
That means medals have been won by more than half of the competing teams at all four Youth and Junior World Championships in the past two years.
“I can’t think of any other Olympic sport that can match that spread of medals,” said Craig Walker, president of the Canadian Federation who was among the medal presenters today.
The same point was made by Simon Kent, president of the New Zealand Federation. “The sport is obviously cleaning up, and that favours us,” he said. “Things are changing.”
Etta Love (CAN)
Canada was on the podium for a second time this week when Etta Love finished second to Sarria. Love, the 17-year-old youth world champion, claimed the clean and jerk youth world record from the Olympic medallist Park Hyejeong when she made her final attempt on 146kg.
Love was close to taking all three youth world records. She failed once, on 111kg when going for the snatch record, and finished 108-146-254. That was up 11kg on her winning Youths total in May, and was 1kg short of the youth record on total.
“I’ll try again for the other two at the senior Worlds in Bahrain in December,” said Love, who had a lot of support in the audience from her parents, brothers, grandparents and a cousin who lives in Spain.
Love has improved her best total by 44kg since her debut two and a half years ago and is aware that she will have to add another 50kg to be competitive in the seniors.
“I love this sport, I feel a deep connection with it,” she said. “I know the numbers I need can be scary, but they’re scary and doable at the same time.
“I’m confident I will continue to improve but I don’t know what my limit is, or how long I’ll have that connection with the bar. The barbell makes me feel alive. I want to go to the (2028) Olympics and continue for as long as that connection remains.”
Canada’s last world record holder was Doug Hepburn in the old clean and press discipline in the early 1950s.
Taiane Justino (BRA)
Brazil had its second medallist in two days when Taiane Justino finished third on 110-141-241. Yairan Tysforod from Colombia won bronze in snatch on 110kg.
In the men’s contest Jiyong Nam moved from fourth at halfway to top of the podium. The 19-year-old Korean came out after everybody else had finished in clean and jerk, needing 223kg for victory. He did it with a lift to spare, which he declined.
Jiyong Nam (KOR)
Robert Kurouski, the Individual Neutral Athlete from Belarus, made 170-212-382 in second place, and Ashot Movsisyan from Armenia was third on 158-208-366.
Robert Kurouski (AIN)
Szymon Ziolkowski from Poland and Numi Tepololo took silver and bronze in snatch on 170kg and 161kg. Tepololo, his country’s first male medallist at a World Championships in any age group, celebrated by performing the haka on the platform after the medal ceremony, as his team-mates joined in from the spectator area.
Irakli Vekua from Georgia, twice a youth world champion, passed the 200kg mark for the first time in competition, aged 17. He made 157-201-358 in fifth place.
Ashot Movsisyan (ARM)
Ali Ammar Yusur will have been watching with interest in Iraq. The 20-year-old, who has snatched 200kg and totalled 427kg at the IWF World Cup in April, was hoping to be in Spain to win gold but instead he has stayed at home to train and put on weight in preparation for Bahrain.
By Brian Oliver