Asian Championships to be first international event for Indian weightlifters

CHENNAI: After months of inactivity, Indian weightlifters will finally be able to participate in an international event in April. The International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) confirmed dates and venue for the 2020 Asian Championships.

The tournament will be held in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

In their bid to qualify for the Olympics, weightlifters have to participate in at least six competitions throughout the overall period starting November 1, 2018, and Tashkent event will be sixth for Indian lifters Mirabai Chanu and Jeremy Lalrinnunga.

Eyeing participation in the Asian Championships, the weightlifters, who are currently camping in Mumbai, will shift their base to NIS Patiala.

"We will end the camp here in Mumbai on February 2 and shift to NIS Patiala immediately. This will be the first international event for our lifters since the 2019 IWF World Championships held in Thailand in September 2019," Vijay Sharma, national weightlifting coach, told this daily.

Given their world rankings, Mirabai (49kg) and Jeremy (67kg) are certain to make an Olympic cut once they compete in Uzbekistan.

"Before the qualification period started, we were expecting four of our lifters to qualify for the Tokyo Games. As of now, Mirabai and Jeremy have qualified given their rankings and that will be it for the country as far as lifters qualifying for the Olympics are concerned," the coach added.

A total of eight weightlifters and as many support staff members including the national coach are at the camp.

The strength is unlikely to go up as the Indian Weightlifting Federation (IWLF) will select lifters from this core group for the continental championships.

The group shifted to Mumbai from Patiala due to cold weather in December.

Earlier, Mirabai, former world champ, went for a two-month training-cum-rehabilitation camp in the USA with coach Sharma and fellow lifter Sathish Sivalingam (77kg).

The IWF issued a revised qualification system as qualifying events were suspended due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

The revised system allows for a further qualification period, which will run from October 1, 2020 to April 30, 2021.

Replacements for the cancelled events originally scheduled will be held during this period and the Asian Championships is one among them.