On the second day of the IWF Grand Prix in Peru, Team USA took home six medals: three silver medals from CJ Cummings and three from Shacasia Johnson, a -76kg athlete who put on a stellar performance and brought home the United States’ first gold medal from the event.
The 23-year-old Missouri native faced stiff competition from the other -76 kilo women:
- Kristel Ngarlem (Canada)
- Leidy Yessenia Solis Arboleda (Colombia)
- Melisa Maida Aguilera Peña (Cuba)
- Neisi Patricia Dajomes Barrera (Ecuador)
- Aremi Fuentes Zavala (Mexico)
- Estrella Belen Saldarriaga Dioses (Peru)
- Shacasia Masha Johnson (USA)
But she managed to go six for six at her meet, beating out Colombia’s Leidy Solis for first place in the snatch with a mighty 107-kilogram lift, which she completed with just one second left on the clock. Watch it below:
https://youtu.be/_22RkrYO1IY
As a side note, if you can believe it, this isn’t even the heaviest snatch Johnson has made in the last month. On October 22, she made a 112-kilogram snatch in training, which is 4 kilos over Quiana Welch’s current American record in the lift:
Back to Lima.
When it was time for the clean & jerks, Johnson came in second with this powerful 134-kilogram lift, seen below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqUdbyXzqr4
But in this portion of the event, she was no match for Leidy Solis, who finished with a tremendous 145-kilogram clean & jerk, earning her gold in this lift and the total.
The final placings for the event were:
Snatch:
Gold: Shacasia Johnson, 107kg
Silver: Leidy Solis, 106kg
Bronze: Aremi Fuentes, 105kg
Clean & Jerk
Gold: Leidy Solis, 145kg
Silver: Shacasia Johnson, 134kg
Bronze: Aremi Fuentes, 131kg
Total:
Gold: Leidy Solis, 251kg
Silver: Shacasia Johnson, 241kg
Bronze: Aremi Fuentes, 236kg
Colombia, in general, has had a terrific showing at the Grand Prix thus far, winning the -61kg Men’s, -67kg Men’s, -55kg Women’s, and now the -76kg women’s divisions.
We’re looking forward to seeing how the event wraps up on Sunday with the heaviest divisions, the -96kg Men (11am EST) and -87kg Women (1:30pm EST). You can stream it all here.