1st IWF Street Weightlifting Championships

The 1st IWF Street Weightlifting Championships was held this week at Quartier du Flon, in Lausanne Switzerland.

Yazmin Zammit Stevens was not only competing at the first ever (IWF) International Weightlifting Federation Street Competition last Saturday in Swizerland, but was named an official Athlete Ambassador for the world of weightlifting. Olympic Gold Medalist Meso Hassona (Qatar), World Revord Holder Lesman Perez (Colombia) and Malta’s very own Yazmin Zammit Stevens were the three athlete ambassadors chosen by the IWF to be a part of the first ever IWF street competition.

The competition was one of the initiatives being taken by the IWF to bring the sport closer to its audiences in an effort to better its image in the coming years. This competition saw a difference in the usual weightlifting competitions which included the event being a mixed team event. The Ambassador team made up of Yazmin and Meso twin the overall title followed by team Italy and Germany.

In the beginning the weather was not on competition’s side but luckily after 45 minutes delay the event was started. Despite the not so perfect weather a great crowd gathered in the centre of Lausanne to see the athletes compete at this first of a kind mixed team event.

Alltogether 14 Athletes participated in 7 teams (1 female and 1 male per team), Team Austria, Team France, Team Germany, Team Italy, Team Switzerland and 2 combined teams, Team International (Colombia and Great Britain) and Team Ambassador (Malta and Qatar).

Compared to other official IWF events the result were based on ROBI points as different bodyweight categories were represented accross the teams.

As at every weightlifting competition the program started with Snatch but this new format changed the order of the event. The teams order’s were based on a system called Round Robin meaning all teams completed their first attempt -both female and male athlete- from lightest to heaviest Snatch attempts and after each round they had a chance to modify their next weights.

This system was used during the pandemic when IWF could only hold competition in an online format.

After the Snatch the ranking was as follows:

Team Germany – 56.8 Robi points

Team Ambassador – 53.1 Robi points

Team Italy – 51.1 Robi point

The program continued with the Clean&Jerk after a short break. The total podium at the end was decided by the three first ranked teams of the Snatch portion of the program, Team Germany, Ambassador and Italy, only the order was a question. Despite being contested in Snatch, Team Ambassador didn’t leave any chance for the other teams in Clean&Jerk.

With an impressive Clean&Jerk of 215kg the Meso Hassona and Yazmin Stevens pair (Team Ambassador) made an overall total of 535kg and with 891.9 Robi points won the 1st IWF Street Weightlifting Championships.

The Silver and Bronze medal were decided between Team Germany and Team Italy. In the last attempt of Team Italy, Fabio Pizzolato went up by 20 kgs (from 160kg to 180kg) compared to his second attempt and with that they earned a combined total of 478kg which meant 810.9 Robi points and also the Silver medal. Even though Team Germany made a better last lift of 275kg (combined). since they are competing in heavier weight classes it meant less Robi points therefore with their last good attempt they took home the Bronze with 807.3 Robi points.

The idea of bringing the audience closer to the sport and to the athletes worked perfectly at the event as we were fortunate enough with an amazing crowd, great atmosphere and fun moments, including dancing, lot of laughing and even a backflip.

Congratulations to all the athletes, and hopefully we will soon see the next version of the IWF Street Weightlifting Championships, this time in another city.