The Olympic medallists Mirabai Chanu and Maude Charron will both be aiming for their third straight Commonwealth Games victory when five days of competition begin in Glasgow on Sunday.
While three men have won three or even four times in a row – Precious McKenzie for England and New Zealand, multiple world champion Louis Martin for England and David Morgan for Wales – no woman has ever had a hat-trick of golds since 2002, before which weightlifting was a men-only sport at these Games.
Mirabai Chanu (IND)
Chanu and Charron are both strong favourites in Glasgow, as is a third Olympic medallist, Emily Campbell, who will be aiming for a second straight Commonwealth Games gold.
At the past two Olympic Games in Tokyo and Paris, Chanu finished second and fourth, Charron won gold then silver, and Campbell won silver and bronze. All three are in their thirties and will probably be thinking about their future after Glasgow, with qualifying for Los Angeles 2028 starting in three months.
Maude Charron (CAN)
India has prepared well with a three-week training camp in the West Midlands of England, at the same place they used before the 2022 Games in Birmingham. Having finished top of the weightlifting medals table at the past three Games, India will need everybody in top form to make it four in a row after its team was weakened by recent doping violations.
Canada could make a strong challenge for top place, while Samoa, Malaysia and Nigeria all have multiple contenders for gold.
Chanu carries India’s flag at the opening ceremony – one of many weightlifters to lead their team at the parade of nations. She lifts on Sunday at 48kg and is a very strong favourite. She finished second at Glasgow 2014, her first Commonwealth Games, before winning in Gold Coast and Birmingham.
Emily Campbell (ENG)
Charron, who like Chanu was second at last year’s IWF World Championships, is in an intriguing 63kg category that features Sarah Davies, who will compete for England under her married name Davies-Smale, and the talented teenager Femily Notte from Nauru. Charron and Davies are 33, nearly twice as old as Notte, who won the senior Oceania title in April aged 17.
Davies won in Birmingham four years ago, has taken back-to-back European titles and is looking forward to returning to Glasgow, having lifted at the 2014 Games in only her second international appearance.
Harrison McGrogan (NIR)
“It’s nice to have that full circle moment. There’s a chance that this will be my last Commonwealth Games, so it’s nice to have that nostalgia of my first one and my last one being in the same city, in the same venue,” Davies said.
Campbell’s strongest challenger in the super-heavyweights is likely to be Iuniarra Sipaia from Samoa. The top contenders on form are all in their thirties, and the youngster to watch in this category could be 18-year-old Etta Love from Canada.
Dimitris Minasidis (CYP)
Other youngsters to look out for include the double junior world champion Charlotte Simoneau from Canada and Olivia Selemaia from New Zealand at 69kg, Onome Didih from Nigeria at 53kg, and Seine Stowers from Samoa at 77kg.
Stowers and Notte are two of the most exciting teenagers not just in Oceania, but worldwide.
In the men’s events, 18-year-old Harrison McGrogan, at 71kg, has a chance of winning a first weightlifting medal for Northern Ireland.
Dika Toua (PNG)
Two winners from the 2014 Glasgow Games are competing 12 years later. Dimitris Minasidis from Cyprus, 37, lifts at 65kg and Dika Toua from Papua New Guinea competes in her sixth Commonwealth Games, aged 42.
Toua is one of three 40-somethings in the 53kg category, alongside Johanni Taljaard from South Africa at 41 and Jenly Wini from Solomon Islands, the oldest lifter in Glasgow at 43. Wini went all the way to Canada in a late attempt to qualify for her fifth Games in May and made it.
By Brian Oliver
