With a confident voice, Said al Ghabashi, chairman of Oman Weightlifting Committee (OWC), affirmed that Oman’s stars in the weightlifting team can clinch the first Olympic medal for the Sultanate at Paris Olympics in 2024.
Keeping that in mind the four-years plan with the Ministry of Sports Affairs should move successfully.
The Vice-Chairman of West Asian Weightlifting Association told Oman Daily Observer that the OWC submitted a detailed proposal with a realistic target to the Ministry for preparing three stars of the national team to accomplish international and Olympic medals.
“The comprehensive plan approved by Shaikh Rashad bin Ahmed al Hinai, the undersecretary of Ministry of Sports Affairs and it began earlier this year. It included providing full funding for the team weightlifters to participate in the regional and global events besides taking a long period of foreign exposure to shape them with high training standards. Unfortunately and due to the current situation of spreading the COVID-19 outbreak, the plan impacted quietly with the postponement of many top international events. However, we still stick to the plan and hope things resume to normal condition to proceed further in our top project,” he added.
Oman national Weightlifting team impressed in many continental and international championships during the last few years. The top national weightlifter Ahmed al Habsi had claimed the gold medal in a top weightlifting championship in 2016. Murshed al Ajmi won the silver medal at the intentional Weightlifting championship in Bangkok in the same year. Oman hosted last year the West Asian and GCC championship in Muscat from March 26 to April 1.
Oman weightlifters team had claimed 87 medals including ten gold medals. This edition of the championship recorded participation of the Oman women weightlifting team. The seven-day event had featured participation of more than 200 weightlifters representing over 18 countries.
The chief of OWC revealed that the committee provided many types of equipment to the top national team weightlifters during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Weightlifting sport is a very costly sport and reaching your goals and objectives required a lot of support from the government and private sector. In every camp and championship, the committee spent a lot in preparing and shaping the weightlifters to the top level. One of the main technical philosophies at the weightlifting team is to keep maintaining the fitness and technical level of the player through the best nutrition system and continuity in the training. During these days, the head coach of the Sultanate team, Mazin al Badri supervised the online training sessions to manage the fitness level for players,” Al Ghabashi concluded.
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