Women Weightlifters Make International Debut

The women’s weightlifting team will make its debut at the 25th Asian Junior Women Weightlifting Championships, April 23-30, in Urgench, Uzbekistan.

The four women weightlifters are Parmida Mahmoodi in 58kg class, Elnaz Babajani in 63kg, Mahdieh Kalali in 69kg and Seyyedeh Narges Mirzaki in +75kg category.

With the women’s event, the 32nd Asian Junior Men Championships will also be held at which 16 men from Iran will participate.

Hamid Rashidi, Ali Amini-Fard, Rashid Sharifi, Abdolreza Fooladi for the men, and Reyhaneh Tariqat, head of women’s affairs in the Weightlifting Federation, are in charge of coaching and managing the teams.

President of Iran Weightlifting Federation Ali Moradi will accompany the squad.

Although Iranian men have done well in weightlifting at the international level, the same cannot be said for women.

It was in March 2016 that the Iran Weightlifting Federation started training women weightlifters.

Earlier this year in February, with the permission from the Ministry of Sports, the federation held the first ever round of competition for women to select the best for the national team.

Female weightlifters from all the provinces took part in the competition and those selected were sent to training camps to prepare for international tournaments.

Moradi says inspiration for Iranian women was Sara Ahmed’s bronze-medal winner for Egypt at the Rio Olympic Games in 2016.

Uzbekistan Weightlifting Federation has been honored by the Asian Weightlifting Federation to host the 19th Asian Youth (qualification event for the Buenos Aires 2018 Youth Olympic Games), 24th Asian Junior Women and 31st Asian Junior Men Weightlifting Championships from April 20-30 in Urgench.