At the World Equipped in Lithuania, the 59kg class open the competition on Monday 13th November. Let's take a look at the top three nominations:
Two-time junior world champion, Yi-Chun Lin, was the silver medallist at last year's World Equipped in Denmark. He's been on the podium at the last six worlds but hasn't yet managed to ascend to the top step. He's nominated a good way in the lead but that might be a little misleading.
Last year, Franklin Leon took the gold medal ahead of Lin, securing his first world title after many years of trying. He hit 702.5kg at that event so he is more evenly matched with Lin than the nominations suggest.
We also have a dark horse contender in Erdenebold Nanzaddorj, who we haven't seen before at this competition. He looks well placed to challenge the top two and give us an exciting start to the world championships.
The 66kg class will lift first on Day 2. We have some familiar faces returning in this class - here are the top three nominations:
Star of classic AND equipped, Tsung-Ting Hsieh is the incoming world champion, a position he has held seven times in a 20 year long career. He is the veteran of five World Games and still holds his position at the top of the tree. Amazingly, after all this time, he is still adding weight to his lifts and it will take something special to knock him off the top spot.
His long-time competitor, Hassan El Belghiti, has a similarly long and storied career, also racking up five World Games appearances. He holds the deadlift world record in this class at 318.5kg, the only man to ever hold this record, which he has been increasing bit by bit for ten years now.
Mariusz Grotkowski is a relative newcome with "only" nine years of international competition under his belt and he has another veteran of the game, Yusuke Satake of Japan, nominated just behind him on 730kg. Again this is a little deceptive as 2022 World Games gold medallist Satake has put up totals of more than 780kg in the recent past so he is a real contender for the podium.
This promises to be a great battle and you won't have to miss a minute. Streamed live and for free on YouTube and Facebook.
Post a Comment