Commonwealth Games: Indian weightlifter Gururaja Poojary wins bronze medal
Indian weightlifter Gururaja Poojary won the bronze medal in the men's 61kg final at the 2022 Commonwealth Games (CWG) in Birmingham on Saturday. Poojary successfully lifted a total of 269kg, (118kg in snatch and 151kg in clean and jerk) to give India its second medal of the 2022 Games. Earlier, Sanket Sargar opened India's account in Birmingham by bagging silver (55kg weightlifting).
2️⃣nd medal for 🇮🇳 at @birminghamcg22 🤩
— SAI Media (@Media_SAI) July 30, 2022
What a comback by P. Gururaja to bag 🥉 with a total lift of 269 Kg in the Men's 61kg Finals🏋♂️ at #B2022
Snatch- 118kg
Clean Jerk- 151kg
With this Gururaj wins his 2nd consecutive CWG medal 🙂
Congratulations Champ!#Cheer4India pic.twitter.com/UtOJiShUvS
Poojary comfortably lifted the required 144 kg in his first clean and jerk attempt. In his second clean and jerk attempt, he lifted 148kg. His total was 266kg (118kg + 144kg). Malaysia's Aznil Bin Bidin Muhamad grabbed the gold medal with a Games record lift of 285kg (127+158). Morea Baru of Papua New Guinea bagged the silver with a total lift of 273kg (121+152).
This was a second successive medal for Gururaja at CWG. He had earlier won the silver medal at the 2018 CWG event in the 56kg category. Meanwhile, he has also won three medals at the Commonwealth Championships.
Earlier in the day, Indian weightlifter Sanket Sargar bagged the silver medal in men's 55kg weightlifting. The Indian lifted 135kg in the clean and jerk round to be in contention for a gold medal. However, he hurt his elbow during his attempt in the second round. Meanwhile, Malaysia's Bin Kasdan clinched the gold medal, finishing ahead of Sargar.
Poojary secured India's 127th medal in weightlifting at the Commonwealth Games. Notably, it is the 35th bronze medal for India at the Games. India is only behind Australia (159) in terms of CWG weightlifting medals.
