Rookie Cao Lei of China made a quite dramatic debut in the world
weightlifting championships as she beat two Russians after the
final lift to win the gold medal at 268kg in the women's 75kg
category in Santo Domingo on Thursday.
The 23-year-old Cao Lei, who placed fourth in the women's 69kg
in the National Games in 2005, shifted to the 75kg class last
December and won her first gold medal in the worlds.
Russian duo, four-times junior world champion Nadezhda
Evstyukhina and Zarema Kasaeva teamed up to block the victory of
the newcomer Cao and Evstyukhina won gold with a lead of 4kg on Cao
in the snatch.
However, the jerk competition brought about a big turn.
Evstyukhina forced Cao to try 150kg hoping that she would miss it.
Cao, however, did jerk this weight, while the Russian could
not.
Evstyukhina took the silver at 267kg while Kasaeva settled with
bronze with a total of 246kg.
"It is quite interesting that the final lift decided the
gold-medal-winner," Cao said.
"I did not expect I could win. A medal would be enough, but now,
it is a gold medal," she added.
"I was disappointed with the result. I should have had a better
result in the jerk. I trained so hard for the Beijing Olympics, and
I will work harder," Evstyukhina said.
In the men's 85kg category, Andrei Rybakou of Belarus, the
snatch world-record holder, won the gold medal with a total of
383kg, a comfortable 10kg lead to the silver medalist Roman
Khamatchine of Russia.
Tigran V. Martirosyan of Armenia took the bronze at 370kg.
(Xinhua News Agency?October 6, 2006)