Sensational world records for Pak Pyol

Pak Pyol marked himself down as one of the world’s very best weightlifters when he beat the 70kg world record by 6kg in winning North Korea’s fourth title of the IWF World Championships in Ningbo, China.

His celebrations were muted, however, when his team-mate Ri Won Ju suffered an elbow injury in trying for victory. Win Ju had two attempts remaining after Pyol’s phenomenal six-from-six 157-198-355, which featured world records in snatch and total.

Won Ju needed to better his own clean and jerk world record by 7kg and the bar was loaded to 205kg. If he made it, it would be up there with the feats of the great Bulgarian lifters of the 1980s.  

He cleaned it but injured his left elbow in trying to complete the lift. It looked serious but Ri made it on to the podium for the medal ceremony, saluting while clearly in pain as the national anthem was played for Pak.

Won Ju is entered in the Olympic 75kg for the IWF Qualifier in Qatar in December alongside the Asian 79kg champion Ri Ryong Hyon, but if he needs surgery or a long recovery time his hopes for Los Angeles 2028 will be in the balance. Pyol, 23, is down for 70kg again in Qatar.

Pyol’s total was more than five times his bodyweight, and he scored more than 1270 GAMX points, the IWF’s favoured scoring system, and 491 Sinclair points. Those numbers are exceptional.

Won Ju was second with 151-192-343 from three good lifts, and He Baozhen from China was third on his international debut with a five-from-six 151-188-339.

Another star performer was Albert Ian Delos Santos from the Philippines, who bettered his own junior world records in clean and jerk and total on 144-187-331. This was only his third senior competition and by far the most important.

“I was the youngest, the smallest, the skinniest in the field, up against PRK and China – for the first time ever I felt fear,” said Delos Santos, 20. “There was just so much pressure, I was a sheep against wolves.

“And now, after that performance, I feel like it’s an honour to be here and to be this near to the leaders.”

The top four were on another level compared with the others, three of whom bombed out.

Delos Santos will go up to 75kg for the Qatar qualifier. “It’s going to be a struggle, eating five or six meals a day to get my weight up,” he said.

There was a sweep of youth world records in the women’s 57kg, which like the men’s event is a non-Olympic category. Shabnam Kerimbayeva from Turkmenistan finished fifth on total aged 16 on 89-112-201.

Oh Kwang Ok won for North Korea, finishing 12kg clear despite being well down on her winning numbers at the Asian Games last month, where she made all six attempts and claimed a sweep of world records on 104-134-238.

Kwang Ok had a few stern looks from her coach as she failed three times on 102-125-227. Chen Guan-Ling from Chinese Taipei was 12kg behind at halfway but matched Oh in clean and jerk, making 90-125-215.

It has been a long wait for Guan-Ling, but she is beginning show why she was hailed as “the next Kuo” (Kuo Hsing-chung, the Olympic champion from Chinese Taipei) after becoming senior world champion as a teenager in 2023, then breaking all three junior world records in winning at the 2024 World Juniors in Leon, Spain.

She has never bettered the 217kg total she made in Spain more than two years ago, but she equalled it when third behind Kwang Ok at the Asian Games and was within 3kg today. Guan-Ling ended up right at the front of the platform when she rescued her final attempt for 90-125-215, setting a personal best in clean and jerk by 3kg.

Olha Ivzhenko from Ukraine made all six attempts for an impressive 96-118-214 in third place. Fourth-placed Aleksandra Grigoryan from Armenia also made a superb final lift, earning clean and jerk bronze on 85-120-205.

Of the 54 medals awarded so far in snatch, clean and jerk and total, 43 have gone to Asian athletes.