After a triumphant week of incredible performances at the 2017 Youth World Weightlifting Championships in Bangkok, USA Weightlifting has been offered three provisional slots at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games, scheduled to be held in Buenos Aires.
This is the first time Team USA has been offered slots at the Youth Olympics through a Worlds Competition — usually they’ve earned by their performance at Pan American competitions.
After earning 107 points at Youth Worlds, Team USA’s men’s team secured two spots in Buenos Aires while the 110 points earned by the women’s team secured them one spot. Overall in the competition, the women’s team earned fourth place and the men’s team sixth place.
In terms of medals, the men’s team earned six medals — four gold and two silver — while the women finished with two bronze medals, one of which was secured by Kuinini Manumua on the last day of the competition.
All of the men’s medals were won by CJ Cummings (69kg) and Harrison Maurus (77kg), who each won two gold medals in the clean & jerk and total and a silver medal in the snatch. Both set youth world records while they were at it: Cummings with a 185kg (407.8lb) clean & jerk and Maurus’ 192kg (423.3lb) clean & jerk.
(Officially, the points and placings awarded are pending the results of anti-doping tests.)
“This was a terrific performance by Team USA,” USA Weightlifting CEO Phil Andrews said in a statement published on their website. “We asked a lot of this team, and they delivered. We look forward to continuing to work towards earning more slots for next year’s Youth Olympic Games.”
This is fantastic news for USA Weightlifting, and it caps off an historic week for them: this is the first time ever that both male and female competitors qualified at the World level for the Youth Olympic Games, and it’s the first time in decades that USA Weightlifting has three world record holders in any age group: Harrison Maurus, CJ Cummings, and multi-time Olympian Cheryl Haworth.
Talk about a busy week for Team USA. Full steam ahead to the Youth Olympics!
Editor’s Note: BarBend is the Official Media Partner of USA Weightlifting. Unless otherwise noted on specific content, the two organizations maintain editorial independence.
Featured image via @usa_weightlifting on Instagram.