One man
has dominated the raw 74kg class for quite some time. Taylor Atwood is
ranked number one on GL Points in the whole IPF. However, the last time did
lose, it was to Kjell Bakkelund and Bakkelund is back! Let's take a look
at the top 5 nominations:
Taylor Atwood USA 777.5kg
Kjell Bakkelund NOR 770kg
Chun-Chia Fan TPE 760kg
Carl Johansson SWE 754.5kg
Steven Day AUS 742.5kg
Atwood's nominated total is from Sheffield, back in
March. However, this does not represent his best effort. He has not
been on top form of late due to injury, so we haven't seen a return to the
800kg+ totals of 2020 and 2021. If he’s back on form, he will be untouchable,
no doubt. But has he had time to fully recover?
At Worlds last year, he wasn't overly challenged.
However, this year he faces the man who beat him in Belarus. Bakkelund is the
current equipped world champion, and he
brought a gold medal back from The World Games last year. He's been busy
though. He won the European Equipped in May and it's tough to train for
both.
Not too far behind is a newcomer to international
competition, Fan. His nomination is from nationals a few weeks ago, which
included a very easy looking 200kg bench. Could he take a bench gold in his
first world championship? He's close enough to the front runners to be
able to maximise if they stumble, so it's going to be interesting to see what
he can do.
Johansson is the current junior world champion with
the big deadlift - he's nominated in 4th with the big squatter from down under,
Day, just behind. And then the next 8 lifters back are nominated within
5kg of each other. That field includes last year's silver and bronze
medallists, Paul Rembauville and Joshua Wright, AND the 2021 world champion,
Alexander Eriksson. Not to mention Tim Monigatti, dropping a weight class coming
in as a real dark horse.
This is the most stacked 74kg class we've ever seen.
Watch it live on the Olympic Channel or our Facebook page at 7pm CET on Tuesday
13th June. Who are you supporting? Let us know in the comments.
Graphic: @strength.journal
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