The 2013 WPF Word Championships
The 2013 WPF World Championships that ran from Nov 1st and ended on Nov 3rd proved to be a successful event. The venue was the beautiful Crowne Plaza O’Hare located just a few miles from the airport making it easily accessible for our international competitors to get to. We had lifters from Great Britain, Mongolia, Mexico and of course the United States of America.
Lifting kicked off on Friday Nov 1st following the opening ceremony where WPF President David Carter said a few words and wished everyone well. All the women were lifting in the first flight and the men 67.5kg to 82.5 kg soon followed in the second flight. There was an impressive amount of weight being lifted by the women and lighter men. Ellen Stein was the most impressive lifter as she was breaking records with her opening attempts for her weight class and age category. Many world records were broken on this day.
Saturday Nov 2nd brought out the men from 90kg to 100kg competing in 2 separate flights. Both the 90kg and 100kg classes had a great battle going on between the lifters. Masters and Open lifters were giving it their all. It was amazing to see the amount of intensity and power that was being displayed this day. Again it was another impressive day of lifting by all. World records also fell on this day.
Sunday Nov 3rd brought out the big boys starting with the 110kg and finishing off with the 140+kg men. There were mainly Masters in the first flight of lifters but if you didn’t know that you would think they were lifting in the Open Division. Second flight of lifters consisted mainly of the Open category and some serious weight was being moved this day and the spotters and loaders had their work cut out for them. The most memorable lifter this day was Andrew Cairney. He sustained injuries on his 2nd squat attempt in both quads but did that stop him? No it did not. Andrew went on to bench and then stiff legged dead lifted for a total for the win. It was inspiring and motivating to see that type of dedication and mental toughness to finish a World Championship. More world records were to be broken once again.
After each day the individual awards presentation commenced. Once day 3 was all over we finished off with the handing out of awards to the individual lifters, then best lifter awards were handed out and soon after the team awards were given to the respected captains of each team. The Great Britain Team dominated each category with the United States of America placing 2nd behind them and Mexico as 3rd in the Full Power category.
Thank you to everyone who helped and or participated to make this World Championships a success.
Lance Karabel