Saturday saw the women’s Olympic weightlifting events in the -81 kg category at the Paris Arena. And even if it is not the sport that arouses the most passion, it is still worth the detour because in terms of spectacle, the performances of these athletes are just as good as the others. In short, in the end, there was one who managed to lift heavier than the others and win the gold medal. Except that the person concerned, the Norwegian Solfrid Koanda, did not realize that she was an Olympic champion.
In the snatch, the Norwegian lifted a 121 kg bar on her second attempt, stumbling on the 3rd with a 124 kg bar. In the clean and jerk, the 25-year-old athlete managed a small, easy 154 kg bar on the 2nd attempt. Greedy, she even tried the world record on her third attempt with a 162 kg bar. Failure.
In his bubble
No problem, at the end of her performance, Solfrid Koanda comes down from the stage to join her team backstage. Concentrated, she probably thinks that the crowd in the stands was just applauding her last performance. But while she is in the middle of the stairs, looking happy but not overly so, her coach says something to her in Norwegian that, of course, we don’t understand. But we can easily imagine his words: “Hey, did you know that you just won the gold medal?”
Obviously, no, she hadn’t realized it. And the joy, we see it appear almost immediately on her face after a few seconds of incomprehension and then disbelief before the young woman rushes on stage to share this with the audience. We find it touching and yeah, we shed a little tear, what’s wrong?
