Wonderful news for Thailand as Thai weightlifter Pimsiri Sirikaew wins a silver medal at the London 2012 Olympics. Her teammate, Bangkok native Kattikan Gulnoi, came in fourth place just missing the bronze medal by 1 kilogramme.
While Thailand doesn’t do very well in the Olympics usually, the country’s weightlifters often do. In this case, though, it was pretty much the last chance for Thailand’s women to win a medal in any sport and, luckily, one of them did.
Going into the final of three lifts, Pimsiri Sirikaew was in sixth place. So she and her coach decided to add 4 kilogrammes to the bars in an effort to blow the rest of the field away. The strategy worked and Pimsiri lifted 140 kilogrammes, not only putting her in place to win the silver medal but also giving the Khon Kaen native a new personal best.
I love watching the Thai weightlifters as they’re such teeny tiny girls, yet they lift amazing amounts of weight. Tonight’s competition was interesting to watch, with the two Thai lifters battling it out for one of the medals.
Pimsiri, though, with her 140 kilo lift, pushed Kattikan Gulnoi down a place, which ended up with her just missing a bronze medal by 1 kilo. Nothing to be ashamed of there either.