Indian weightlifter Saikhom Mirabai Chanu finished sixth in the Asian Championship, held in Jinju, Korea. Jiang Huihua from China won the gold medal, followed by Tokyo Olympic gold medallist Hou Zhihui in second place and Thailand’s Serodchana Khambao in third place. Chanu was competing in the 49kg category and lifted 85kg in snatch and 109kg in clean and jerk for an overall effort of 194kg, which is 13kg less than her personal best of 207kg.
Chanu managed to lift 85kg in her first snatch attempt but failed to lift 88kg in her next two attempts. She chose not to make her last two clean and jerk attempts. In the last Asian Championship in 2021, Chanu won a bronze medal and a world record in clean and jerk (119kg). However, this year she only attempted a 109kg lift before deciding not to go for her final two attempts. The reason for this decision is not known yet, but the head coach Vijay Sharma had earlier stated that Chanu’s aim is to peak at the Asian Games later this year.
China’s Jiang Huihua won the gold medal with a total lift of 207kg, followed by Hou Zhihui with 204kg and Thailand’s Serodchana Khambao with 200kg. The championship is one of the qualifying events for the 2024 Paris Olympics, where weightlifting events will be reduced from 14 at Tokyo Games to 10. However, it is an additional event and not a compulsory one.
Under the 2024 Olympic qualification rule, a lifter has to compulsorily compete in the 2023 World Championships and the 2024 World Cup. Apart from these two events, a lifter also has to participate in three of the following events — the 2022 World Championships, the 2023 Continental Championships, the 2023 Grand Prix 1, the 2023 Grand Prix II, and the 2024 Continental Championships. The International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) will publish the Olympic Qualification Rating (OQR) of each weight category at the end of the qualification period. A weightlifter’s best three performances at the qualifying events will be taken into account for final assessment.
