There was a packed schedule of lifting last Sunday in what was the final competition of 2017. The annual national weightlifting championships saw numerous records being broken, and many personal bests achieved.
The women’s session was dominated by , Elisia Scicluna, and a relative new face to the weightlifting scene, Christina Grima. Elisia finished with a 156kg total and crowned national champion in the 75kg category. In the 69kg category, Christina Grima gave a powerful performance finishing with personal best lifts and a 144kg total that was enough for Grima to finish top of the class as national champion.
12 year old Tenishia Thorton may still be very young and somewhat unexperienced in the weightlifting scene, but performed like a true veteran at these championships.. She finished with 9 national records and all personal best lifts in the 40kg category lifting the total of 70kg.
Other important results came from Shelby Mangion Vassallo, who snatched a personal best only 2 weeks after her stellar performance in Ljubljana. She finished with a snatch of 58kg, breaking 2 national records in the youth (-17) and Junior (-20) category. Daniela Xuereb (-48kg) also broke the snatch senior national record with her 38kg attempt.
The men’s 94kg category session proved to be a very close and exciting one. Vlad Baldacchino, Rodmar Pulis and Owen Bugeja were all going head to head with very few kilos separating them. Baldacchino ended up winning the Championship title with an easy 115kg snatch and 135kg clean and jerk with the total of 250kg, Rodmar Pulis showed real class finishing with a 98kg snatch and impressive 140kg clean and jerk. This clean and jerk was the heaviest lift at the meet and, for Pulis, it proves he is almost back to his peak performance before his injury last year, he end with a total of 239kg. Owen Bugeja finished in a respectable third place with a total of 226kg in seniors and 1st place in Juniors.
In the 85kg category, Matthew Camilleri gave 2016 national champion Kyle Micallef a good battle and ended up taking his title by winning the category with 240kg. Kyle followed with 238kg and a respectable second place. In the 85kg category juniors Andy Grech finished in 1st place with a total of 198kg
Michael Fava dominated the 77kg category, improving his overall total by 5kg only 1 month after his impressive performance in Serbia with a total of 210kg. Ryan Degiorgio winning his first national title in the 69kg junior category with a total of 175kg.
Other impressive results came from Malta’s youngest weightlifter, Rylee Borg, who broke 7 national records in the 5okg category with a total of 87kg and also Kyle Camilleri who broke 1 national record in the 40kg category with a total of 64kg.