China’s Li retains gold as Olympic weightlifting starts

Connie Chiume 
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China’s Li Fabin retained his Olympic 61-kilogramme title as the first gold of the weightlifting competition was decided on Wednesday.
The 31-year-old lifted a total of 310 kilogrammes over the two rounds in the lightest men’s class. 
He beat Theerapong Silachai of Thailand by 7kg with Hampton Morris of the United States third, another 5kg back.
In the snatch round, Li set what will be the first of many Olympic records in Paris as he lifted 143kg to break the mark he set when the class was first contested in Tokyo three years ago. He was 3kg short of his own world record.
Eight of the nine other categories in Paris are new as weightlifting adapts after its programme was cut from 14 gold medals to 10.
The pressure told early on as Trinh van Vinh of Vietnam and John Ceniza of the Philippines, who were both ranked in the top four in the class coming into the Games, failed on all three attempts at the weight they had chosen in the opening snatch.