Chinese Liu Chunhong Breaks 3 World Records in 69kg Class Weightlifting

Chinese strongwoman Liu Chunhong broke three world records to retain her Olympic champion title in the women's 69kg category on Wednesday at the Beijing Olympics.

Liu, 23, snatched 128kg, which is the first world record created by Chinese at Bejing Games, jerked 158kg, totaling 286kg.

Instead of an one-to-one battle between Liu Chunhong and Russian lifter Slivenko as predicted, Wednesday's event turned out to be a perfect one-person show of the Chinese woman Hercules at the Beijing University Aeronautics and Astronautic gymnasium.

Chinese women's weightlifting team coach Ma Wenhui said before the event that it would be an intense competition and Liu may have to break the world record to be the winner.

Although Slivenko finished the snatch session with a disappointing 115kg, eight kilos less than her own world record while Liu easily snatched 120kg in her first attempt, the defending champion seemed to have her mind set on getting the record back.

She succeeded the second attempt of 125kg, bettering the previous score by two kilos, and she shattered the minute-old mark with a lift of 128kg in the third.

Slivenko then jerked 136kg and 140kg, securing the silver medal, and gave up the third attempt.

It's Liu's turn now.

She succeeded in her first attempt for 145kg and then asked a record-breaking 149kg and made a good lift.

The ambitious lifter didn't stop. In her last attempt, she jerked 158kg and totaled 286kg, rewriting the world record of jerk, previously owned by Russian Zarema Kasaeva, as well as the total, which was newly set by herself.

Liu claimed her previous Olympic title four years ago also by smashing three world records.

Slivenko, who won golds in 2006 and 2007 world championships, got the silver with 255kg, and the bronze went to Natalya Davydova of Ukraine, who finished with 250kg.

(Xinhua News Agency August 13, 2008)

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