Iran’s Davoudi set for greatness at Asian Weightlifting Championships
The Asian Weightlifting Championships, which started in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, on Friday, will be a real test for the Iranian prodigy Ali Davoudi, who will be looking to make his mark in the +109kg weight class.
A gold medal in Tashkent will put the 22-year-old on the verge of securing a quota place for the Tokyo Olympics in July, seeing him emerge as a major contender for the superheavyweight gold in Japan.
Davoudi will be hoping to follow in the footsteps of Iranian greats Hossein Rezazadeh and Behdad Sailimi, who dominated the super-heavyweight category for over a decade in the early 2000’s.
Rezazadeh won successive golds in Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004, with Salimi claiming the top prize at the 2012 London Games.
Iranians’ reign, however, came to an end at Rio 2016, when Georgian Lasha Talakhadze stood atop the division on his breakthrough at the Olympics.
The triple world-record holder Georgian will be the clear favorite to repeat his success in Tokyo, but Davoudi, who holds the junior world records for the snatch and total in the +109 kg class, and Armenian Gor Minasyan – silver medalist in Rio – will surely make it a fascinating battle for the second spot in Tokyo.