With the Olympic Games fast approaching, sports fans all over the world will be watching closely to see their country compete in a huge variety of different sports. Not only will they be watching, but they will be betting both in betting shops and online on these sports too.
If you are interested in weightlifting, you know that there are several countries that are favourites to do well during the events. Which country should you be looking to to dominate the event this year? We’ve included options found online at betting sites covering the Olympics and specifically weightlifting.
The IWF World Cup
Taking place from Sunday the 31st of March to Thursday the 11th of April, the IWF World Cup was the last compulsory competition for any weightlifter looking to earn qualification for the Paris 2024 Olympics. The competition took place in Phuket, Thailand, and saw top competitors from all over the world come to earn their qualifications.
This event gave us a good look at who will be going to the Olympics this year, and which competitors are going to be the strongest, and therefore the ones to watch. This is the case even though the competition in Thailand was very different to how it will play out at the Olympics this year. This is thanks to the Olympics not having competitors not directly competing against each other, and other differences to how the judging works.
Even so, we saw some excellent competition at the World Cup this year, and it gives us a good idea of who will be the ones to beat at the Olympics.
The Loss Of Phuket’s Entry
What was really surprising was that Phuket are currently not able to compete themselves in the upcoming Olympics. This was because it was unable to enter the Olympic qualifying program at the right time, so the competitors here will not be able to gain eligibility to go to the competition. This was thanks to their absence from the competitive scene thanks to the COVID pandemic.
They would have been a team to watch, as the country claimed eight victories at the World Cup, and eight world records too, with seven of them gained by their female competitors. If they would have been able to go to the Olympics, they certainly would have been difficult to beat by other countries competing. Instead, we will have to hope they make their way to the Olympics in 2028, and really show what they are capable of.
China’s Top Competitors
At the World Cup, we saw China really give it their all to the competition. In fact they had nine qualified competitors in total, when the limits for the Olympics is six. As such, they now have to decide who will not be making their way to the event in the summer.
Even with such successes under their belt, the men’s team were seen to underperform when compared to their women’s team. In fact, their national head coach Yu Jie commented that he was glad their weaknesses were exposed during the event, as they would work on strengthening them before the Games.
One of the world record breakers during the World Cup was Liu Huanhua at 102 kg, who joined four other record breakers during the entire event. We also saw long time rankings leader Jiang Huihua overtaken by a team mate for the first time as well.
USA’s Successes
The USA saw similar success during the World Cup as well. They will be taking five athletes to Paris, as well as Egypt, Korea, and Venezuela. In fact, USA needs to refuse women’s places, because they have exceeded the limit of three.
One of the standout stars from the USA was Hampton Morris, who broke a world record at 61kg. That makes him his country’s first senior world record holder in 55 years.
With the USA taking the cream of the crop with them to Paris this year, you will be wanting to keep an eye on them.
Teams Yet To Come Together
While we saw so many different countries solidify their teams for the Olympic Games this year, there are still teams that we do not know everything about yet. For example, the refugee team will not be completely defined until June, so we have still yet to find out who will be competing for this team.
The full list of 120 different competitors for Paris will not be made public until June either, so we still don’t know exactly who will be competing at the event. Thanks to the World Cup though, we know who to be keeping an eye on and who will be potentially breaking records at the Olympic Games this year.
China and the USA have some excellent competitors in their teams, making them two countries you must watch in weightlifting this year. With final teams yet to be released though, we could see some changes to this in the coming months.
