If there is one sport at the Aichi-Nagoya 2026 Asian Para Games packed with Paralympic champions, it is the one being held at the Nagoya City Trade and Industry Center. Para powerlifting will feature 13 of the 20 Paris 2024 gold medallists in action.
A total of 23 medal events will be contested from 19 to 24 October: 10 men’s events, 10 women’s events, and three team competitions (men, women and mixed). Complete schedule and results can be found here.
China arrived in Aichi-Nagoya with all six of their Paralympic champions and aiming to improve on the 17 gold medals won three years ago in Hangzhou, including a clean sweep of the women’s events.
But Lingling Guo alone would be enough to attract attention, given her remarkable unbeaten run.
Women’s events
A two-time Paralympic champion and five-time world champion, Guo will compete in her third Asian Para Games. She claimed gold on her debut at Jakarta 2018 in the women’s up to 45kg and added another title at Hangzhou 2022, this time in the women’s up to 41kg, setting the current world record of 123kg.
In Japan, Guo will once again compete in the women’s up to 45kg category, in which she is the reigning Paralympic and world champion and world record holder thanks to the 125kg mark she set at last year’s World Championships in Cairo. She will also be part of the China’s line-up in the women’s team event. Earlier this year, she claimed the Asia-Oceania Open Championships title in Bangkok.
Zhe Cui is another star among China’s female powerlifters and a Paralympic and world title holder. She has collected Asian Para Games gold medals at Guangzhou 2010, Incheon 2014, Jakarta 2018 and Hangzhou 2022. Cui will compete in the women’s up to 41kg.
The other Chinese Paris 2024 champions in women’s events are Miaoyu Han (up to 79kg) and Yujiao Tan (up to 73kg). Han is the athlete to beat in her category, having won gold at both Jakarta 2018 and Hangzhou 2022.
Tan made her Paralympic debut at London 2012 and two years later captured gold in the women’s up to 67kg at her first Asian Para Games in Incheon. She defended that title at Jakarta 2018 and added a third Asian Para Games crown in Hangzhou.
Following her third Paralympic title, Tan moved up to the women’s up to 73kg category, winning both the Cairo 2025 world title and the Asia-Oceania title earlier this year.
Among the athletes to watch from other nations are two Paris 2024 Paralympic medallists and three medallists from the Cairo 2025 World Championships.
Kamolpan Kraratpet won Thailand’s first Paralympic medal in Para powerlifting in 16 years with her bronze in the women’s up to 55kg at Paris 2024. She also won bronze on her Asian Para Games debut at Hangzhou 2022. The 25-year-old will again compete in the women’s up to 55kg, where Chinese veteran Cuijuan Xiao, a five-time Paralympic medallist, tops the qualification rankings. Kraratpet will also represent Thailand in the women’s and mixed team events.
Uzbekistan’s Ruza Kuzieva is her country’s most successful powerlifter with two Paralympic silver medals. She will be one of the main challengers to Tan in the women’s up to 73kg. It will be her second Asian Para Games appearance after winning gold in her debut at Jakarta 2018 in the women’s up to 55kg.
Compatriot Nasiba Tashpulatova will make her Asian Para Games debut in Japan in the women’s up to 50kg, where China’s Peiqing Xiao leads the qualification rankings. Tashpulatova won bronze in the women’s up to 45kg at the Cairo 2025 World Championships and will also represent Uzbekistan in the mixed team competition, while Kuzieva will compete in the women’s team event.
Jordan’s Asma Issa claimed her first World Championships podium in her fifth appearance, earning bronze in the women’s up to 79kg in Cairo last year. It was Jordan’s first medal at a major World Para Powerlifting competition since Tharwat Alhajaj’s Paralympic silver at Rio 2016.
Alhajaj will also compete in Aichi-Nagoya. Both athletes claimed silver medals at the last Asian Para Games, with Issa finishing second in the women’s up to 79kg and Alhajaj in the women’s up to 86kg. Issa will face Paralympic champion Han, while Alhajaj is expected to challenge Cairo world champion Feifei Zheng. Both Chinese athletes are reigning Asian Para Games champions.
One of the first two women to represent Iran at the World Para Powerlifting Championships in Dubai in 2023, Nikoo Rozbahani made history by becoming the first Iranian woman to win a medal at the Worlds, taking bronze in the women’s over 86kg at Cairo 2025. She also claimed bronze in the same event on her Asian Para Games debut at Hangzhou 2022. Cairo 2025 silver medallist Wenjun Zhu of China is likely to be her biggest rival in Aichi-Nagoya.
Men’s events
Asian athletes dominated the men’s competition at the highest level, winning nine of the 10 Paralympic gold medals at Paris 2024 and eight of the 10 titles at the Cairo 2025 World Championships.
Six Para powerlifters arrive in Japan as reigning Paralympic and world champions: Kazakhstan’s David Degtyarev (men’s up to 54kg), Malaysia’s Bonnie Bunyau Gustin (up to 72kg), China’s Panpan Yan (up to 88kg), Jordan’s Abdelkareem Khattab (up to 97kg), Iran’s Aliakbar Gharibshahi (up to 107kg) and Ahmad Aminzadeh (over 107kg).
All six also won gold medals at the Hangzhou 2022 Asian Para Games, although Yan and Khattab have since changed categories. Yan dropped from the men’s up to 97kg division, while Khattab moved up from the men’s up to 88kg. Gustin (232kg), Khattab (270kg) and Gharibshahi (255kg) also hold world records in their respective categories.
The opening event of the Para powerlifting programme will feature another Paris 2024 gold medallist. Jordan’s Omar Qarada sits second behind Indonesia’s A Hadi in the qualification rankings for the men’s up to 49kg, but he enters the competition as the reigning Paralympic champion after successfully defending his title in Paris. He also won silver at Cairo 2025 and will defend his Asian Para Games crown from Hangzhou. A Hadi arrives after winning the Asia-Oceania Open Championships title in Bangkok earlier this year.
The men’s up to 65kg will pit the Paralympic and world champions against one another. China’s Yi Zou won gold at Paris 2024 but finished 10th at the Worlds in Cairo last year, where compatriot Shiwei Zhou took the title. Zou remains the world record holder thanks to a 222kg lift that secured gold at the last Asian Para Games, and he beat Zhou for the Asia-Oceania title in April.
The Paris 2024 champion and world record holder in the men’s up to 80kg, Iran’s Roohallah Rostami, has since moved into the up to 88kg category and claimed silver at Cairo 2025 behind Yan. Reigning world champion Xiaofei Gu of China is the favourite in the men’s up to 80kg after also winning gold at Hangzhou 2022 and the Asia-Oceania title this year.
The men’s up to 59kg is the only category in which neither the reigning Paralympic nor world champion comes from Asia. China’s Yongkai Qi won silver at Paris 2024 and bronze at Cairo 2025. He is the reigning Asian Para Games champion and also captured the Asia-Oceania title in April but qualified second in the rankings behind Iraq’s Mustafa Radhi.
Radhi is the Cairo 2025 silver medallist and set an Asian record of 208kg earlier this year while competing at the African Open Championships in Oran, Algeria.
Team events
Team events will make their debut at the Asian Para Games.
The men’s team competition will feature hosts Japan alongside China, Iraq, Uzbekistan, Iran, Kazakhstan and South Korea.
In the women’s team event, Uzbekistan, China, Indonesia, South Korea, India, Thailand and Kazakhstan will vie for medals.
Ten nations will compete in the mixed team event: China, Uzbekistan, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Iraq, Thailand, South Korea, Iran, Japan and Vietnam.
Complete Aichi-Nagoya 2026 Para powerlifting schedule:
Monday, 19 October
Men’s up to 49kg
Women’s up to 41kg
Men’s up to 54kg
Women’s up to 45kg
Men’s up to 59kg
Tuesday, 20 October
Women’s up to 50kg
Men’s up to 65kg
Women’s up to 55kg
Men’s up to 72kg
Women’s up to 61kg
Wednesday, 21 October
Men’s up to 80kg
Women’s up to 67kg
Men’s up to 88kg
Women’s up to 73kg
Men’s up to 97kg
Thursday, 22 October
Women’s up to 79kg
Men’s up to 107kg
Women’s up to 86kg
Men’s over 107kg
Women’s over 86kg
Friday, 23 October
Men’s Team Event
Women’s Team Event
Saturday, 24 October
Mixed Team Event
