Lifting for Life 2019 marked the first competition for the new GWA Executive in the new year. Another great competition to kick start the new year following the Interclub Lift off a month before at CrossFit Jozi East.

This year’s Lifting for Life was held at Barbell 1610 and organised by Caroline Wolf, owner of the facility.

As always, the competition was beautifully and professionally set up and organised and, as always, the same amazing vibe was felt throughout the entire competition.

We welcomed back a lot of friendly faces and a number of new faces to the platform as they competed for the first time.

The competition itself was an important one for our Master’s Athletes who were in the process of preparing for the Masters SA vs AUS Team Challenge, both competitions being qualifiers for the Masters Weightlifting World Championships happening in later August.

The competition ran over the single day, Saturday the 9th of March – all weight categories competing on the same day.

The energy in the warmup area was infectious, all team members encouraging one another in their warmup lifts, chatting, laughing, smiling together, summing up the overall resounding description of the event – fun!

One of the more exciting moments of the competition was seeing our stronger female lifters in the 64kg weight category, namely Lize Nel and Nikita van Rooyen, battle it out for the biggest total – it was incredibly close! Ultimately, Lize managed to claim the highest total, setting a new personal best clean & jerk – a massive 99kgs!

Lize managed to put up a 173kg total, the highest total of the day, with a 74kg snatch, while Nikita came in at a close second with a 169kg total, hitting a 77kg snatch and a 92kg clean and jerk.

For the men, Master’s lifter Altus van Zyl put up the highest total of the day – 274kgs! He obtained a 122kg snatch and a 152kg clean and jerk.

Overall, the vast majority of our lifters had incredibly successful sessions, having a lot of fun and feeling a ton of excitement in the process.