World Youth & Junior Weightlifting Championships:
Iranian girl Hosseini wins double medals
Iranian girl Alma Hosseini notched up a couple of medals on Day 3 of the IWF World Youth & Junior Championships in Lima, Peru.
Representing the country in Friday’s youth 64kg contests, Hosseini, 17, tallied 86kg to miss out on the snatch podium, finishing fourth behind Albanian Carja Enkileda (98kg), Nauru’s Crystie Notte Femliy (92kg) and Russian Valeriia Drevnovskaia (86kg), who participated as a neutral athlete.
Hosseini, however, delivered a much-improved performance in the clean & jerk, starting with a successful 108kg lift before raising 111kg above her head with the second attempt.
The Iranian fell short against the 116kg weight but her second effort was still enough to secure the C&J silver for the teenager.
Enkileda won her second gold of the afternoon with 115kg, while Femliy finished on 110kg to take the bronze.
An 86-111-197 record clinched the total bronze for Hosseini, who finished behind Enkileda (213kg) and Femliy (202kg).
Hosseini’s impressive display saw her better all three national records of her class by four, 10, and 14 kilograms in the snatch, clean & jerk, and total categories, respectively.
“I had done much better in the backstage and I’m sure I would have won more colorful medals if I had repeated my warm-up lifts on the stage,” Hosseini said, adding: “This was my last year in the youth age group and I just hope to win more medals when I take part in the junior class next year.”
Iran head coach Elham Hosseini praised Alma’s fighting spirit, while acknowledging the challenges she faced.
“Alma showed incredible determination and fought hard, though she couldn’t quite match the personal bests she’d achieved in training, but there was a good reason for that.
“We had a long journey to Lima, and our sleeping schedules were completely disrupted. Alma’s competition started at 3 AM Iran time, and she hadn’t fully adjusted to the time difference. For an athlete, that kind of disruption is extremely tough to overcome,” said the Iranian coach.
Hosseini’s medals were the first for an Iranian girl since Yekta Jamali had won maiden female medals for the country in the 2021 world youth event in Jeddah, collecting C&J and total silvers plus a snatch bronze in the 81kg weight class.