Weightlifters eye glory at Asian Meet in Uzbekistan
Sri Lanka’s weightlifters will be bidding for glory at the 2020 Asian Weightlifting Championship which will be held from April 16 to 25 in Uzbekistan.
The Sri Lanka Weightlifting Federation (SLWF) selected four athletes after conducting a performance trial for the elite weightlifting pool in Polonnaruwa in February. Sports Minister Namal Rajapaksa has approved the four-member team, according to G. Nishanthan, General Secretary of the SLWF.
Army’s Nilanka Isurukumara (55kg), Navy’s Indika Dissanayake (73kg) and Viraj Palangasinghe (61kg) are the three men representing Sri Lanka while the solitary woman competitor is Navy’s Chathurika Priyanthi (81kg).
This is the first time Sri Lanka’s weightlifters will be participating in an international competition since the 2019 South Asian Games (SAG) in Kathmandu. The SLWF aims to achieve two objectives by participating in this tournament, to qualify for the Tokyo Olympic Games and to assess their standard for the 2022 Commonwealth Games. Improving performance than targeting medals is the main aim of participating in the Tashkent tournament, according to SLWF.
The officials accompanying the four-member team are R.B. Wickramasinghe (head coach), Rukshan Gunatilleke and P.K.N. Dayan (assistant coaches) in addition to Udeshika Nirmana (Measures). However, the Sports Ministry has not approved a manager to go on the tour with the team.