IWF board seat gives Hidilyn voice in charting troubled sport’s future

Hidilyn Diaz-Naranjo achieved another milestone in her career as a weightlifting world champion and Olympic gold medalist.

The first Olympic gold medalist has gained further influence in the top echelon of her sport as Diaz-Naranjo joins the Executive Board (EB) of the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF).

The fourth Olympian who won gold in the women’s 55 kilograms at the 2021 Tokyo Summer Games sat out the 10-man IWF EB for the first time during a recent online meeting.

“I just watched and listened to our discussion at the IWF EB. We recently met and I will try to see how I can help,” Diaz-Naranjo told the Inquirer.

Diaz-Naranjo, who also won a silver medal at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, will work for weightlifters from around the world under the new designation, alongside fellow athletes Forrester Osei of Ghana and Luisa Peters, a retired lifter from Cook. island.

Osei retained the leadership of the IWF Athletes Commission during last month’s election while Diaz-Naranjo became vice-chairman of the 10-member commission.

“I can see that the EB officials really have a heart for weightlifting. We will work on the problems for the progress of our sport,” said Diaz-Naranjo, whose large social media of 270,000 can help the message of the weightlifting federation.

historical moment

IWF President Mohamed Jalood hailed the move to install three representative athlete commissions at the EB as a historic moment in the sport, pointing out that the IWF is the first international federation to achieve this level of athlete representation.

This is a step in the right direction as weightlifting entered an important phase in its history when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) initially removed the sport from the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic program due to doping concerns among some IWF athletes.

Unfortunately, the proposed lifting of weightlifting in Los Angeles comes at a time when Philippine weightlifting has been growing on the international front.

Hoping to follow Hidilyn’s footsteps to greatness are Asian champion Vanessa Sarno, Tokyo Olympian Elreen Ando, ​​Southeast Asian Games gold medalist Kristel Macrohon and world junior gold player Rosegie Ramos, among others.

corruption

The IOC, which hosts the quadrennial Olympics, decided to temporarily remove weightlifting from the LA program along with boxing and modern pentathlon.

International weightlifting officials were charged with corruption in an investigative report in June 2021, which accused them of covering up doping cases for Olympic medal-winning lifters and world champions.

The former IWF official was charged under the World Anti-Doping Code with complicity and violations.

The IOC will reassess its weightlifting position this year as the IWF tries to get into LA and reverse the gloomy view that Paris 2024 could be the last Olympics. INQ

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