(Left to Right) Elreen Ando, Vanessa Sarno, Rosegie Ramos, and Lovely Inan. | Facebook and Inquirer photos
CEBU CITY, Philippines — Lovely Inan and Rosegie Ramos will be the first two Filipina weightlifters from the Samahang Weightlifters ng Pilipinas (SWP) to take centerstage in the 2024 Asian Senior Weightlifting Championships-Olympic Qualifiers in Tashkent, Uzbekistan on Sunday, February 4, 2024.
Both Ramos and Inan will compete in the women’s 49-kilograms weightlifting division against seven other contenders.
Olympic medalists in the division, Zhihui Hou of China, Saikhom Mirabai Chanu of India, and Indonesia’s Windy Cantika Aisah won’t be competing.
Instead, the line-up of the women’s 49kgs weightlifting division will have Vietnam’s Pham Dinh Thi, Uzbekistan’s Jamila Panfilova, Song Gum Ri of North Korea, Taiwan’s Wan Ling Fang, Japan’s Rira Suzuki, Taiwan’s Cheng-Jing Lin, and Thailand’s Surodchana Khambao.
After Ramos and Inan’s 49kgs division competition, Cebu’s pride Elreen Ando will compete on February 5, Monday, in the 59kgs division A.
Ando will go up against 10 other weightlifters in Kim Il Gyong (North Korea), Thi Tam Quang (Vietnam), Lyudmila Elefteriadi (Uzbekistan), Sarah (Indonesia), Natasya Beteyob (Indonesia), Enkhtamir Enkhbaatar (Mongolia), Thanaporn Saetia (Thailand), Subreen Dari (Palestine), Kristina Shermetova (Turkmenistan), and Srity Akther (Bangladesh).
The Olympic medalists won’t also be competing in Ando’s weightlifting division.
Lastly, Boholana Asian Weightlifting championships gold medalist Vanessa Sarno will be the last Filipina to compete for the Philippines. Sarno’s women’s 71kgs division competition is slated on Wednesday, February 7.
Sarno will compete against 11 other weightlifters in Runa Segawa (Japan), Guk Hyang Song (North Korea), Afriza Indah (Indonesia), Wen Huei Chen (Taiwan), Mai Ahad Almadani (UAE), Reihaneh Karilmi (Iran), Thi Hong Thanh Pham (Vietnam), Faetmeh Keshavarz (Iran), Minhee Mun (South Korea), Tsabitha Alfiah Ramadani (Indonesia), and Hanan Alameer (Kuwait).
Olympic gold medalist Hidilyn Diaz has decided to skip the Olympic qualifying tilt in Uzbekistan for unknown reasons, while Rose Jean Ramos is nursing a lower back injury according to national weightlifting coach Ramon Solis who is with the team right now.
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