Author Jo Whiteley
105kg
The King returned to competition this week but Ukraine’s Anatolii Novopismennyi found the Swedish Prince all grown up and ready to rumble. Emil Norling is the current world champion and carries a huge amount of momentum. At this competition last year, Norling came out on top, pulling a phenomenal 375kg to sneak past Novopismennyi by 2.5kg for the European title but we missed the big showdown in South Africa when the Ukrainian couldn’t make it.
Novopismennyi dominated on squats, as expected, but he missed a world record attempt of 360.5kg, leaving him with 350kg for the gold. Corentin Clement (FRA) squatted 332.5kg for the silver medal and the junior world record and Norling picked up the bronze with 330kg
On bench, Norling faltered, missing his 200kg opener and having to re-take it. Novopismennyi pushed out ahead even further by taking bench gold with 215kg. Clement took the bench silver and overall second place with a 205kg press, pushing Norling down to third.
Norling moved ahead of Clement in the second round of deadlifts with a monstrous 362.5kg pull, closing the gap to the Ukrainian to a mere 7.5kg. Clement’s 357.5kg second looked on the limit and we did not see him return to the platform again.
Meanwhile, Abdul Sulayman (GBR) was cutting a swathe through the pack with an effortless second deadlift of 365kg, putting him just 10kg behind Clement.
Novopismennyi was first to emerge in the final round but 350kg was a little too heavy and he had to retreat to the back room, hoping that his 905kg total was enough to keep Norling at bay. GBR’s Ben Pape rounded out a great day with a 360kg pull for the deadlift bronze.
With the European title on the line, Norling looked confident as her approached 372.5kg. And with good reason! He was smiling even as the bar was still travelling to lockout.
However, one more lift remained. Sulayman, ever a showman, called for 387.5kg to pull for the win A hugely ambitious attempt, 377.5kg would have got him onto the podium but he was only interested in shooting for gold. It moved so fast off the floor, it must have given Norling a shock, but it stalled out early when his grip went. Sulayman finished off the podium and Norling took his third European Open title.
It’s worth noting that Novopismennyi was pretty light in class, weighing in at 102.78kg compared to Norling’s 104.7kg. This gave us the unusual position that the guy in second place took the lead in the Best Lifter contest. Not something you see very often.