An encouraging number of lifters have competed in the Malta Club championship, the sixth in the series organised by the Malta Weightlifting Association at the Cottonera Sports Complex.
The participants, aged between 10 and 35, represented five local clubs with the outfits from Cottonera Weightlifting and CrossFit 356 engaged in an exciting battle for the honours at stake.
Cadet lifters took to the platform first as Rylee Borg and Kyle Micallef produced strong performances and two national records to give the Cottonera club an early edge.
It was then the turn of the competitors in the men’s A category.
All contenders showed they were fully motivated, particularly Andy Grech and Vlad Baldacchino as they set new personal bests in the process.
Kyle Micallef produced the best lift of the day in the A Group with a successful clean and jerk of 150kg.
A total of 18 new records were established in the women’s championship lift.
Shazel Gusman wrote her name 10 times in the record books, in both youth and junior categories, as she finished off with a total of 106kg.
Rebecca Fitz and Krista Camilleri also achieved one record apiece.
Fitz did well in the junior lift as Camilleri pushed the level higher in the clean and jerk in the 63kg category with a lift of 85kg.
Yazmin Zammit Stevens was outstanding on the day, amassing a 155kg total and breaking six records in the 63kg, a category that witnessed an exciting contest between Zammit Stevens, Camilleri and Jessica Borg Ghigo in both snatch and clean and jerk events.
The men’s B competition was the last in programme.
At this juncture, CrossFit 356 were enjoying a healthy advantage of almost 800 points over five-times Malta Club championship winners Cottonera Weightlifting.
Thus, the Cottonera lifters knew well that they had to pull off another impeccable, all-round performance if they were to retain the title.
Once again, the Cottonera lifters showed they were up for the task with Kieran Mifsud enjoying a great comeback after injury. He finished with a total of 204kg.
Others to top performers for Cottonera Weightlifting were Owen and Kurt Camilleri, Andre Buhagiar and Michael Fava. They all produced personal best lifts on the day.
On the back of their fine results in the final group, Cottonera Weightlifting succeeded in dragging themselves out of a hole and compile a winning total of 2,674 points, just enough to clinch the title for a sixth successive time.
CrossFit 356 had to settle for second place on the day, with 2,326 points, and The Pit ranked third in the final classification on 683 points.
Fourth and fifth places went to University Degree Plus Club and Tritons with 510 and 330 points, respectively.