Taiwan won its second medal yesterday after Kuo Yi-hang (
"I am extremely happy. It's my best result ever," Kuo said to media after the competition.
All three of the medalists lifted 245kg in the clean-and-jerk and snatch competition.
PHOTO: LIN CHENG-KUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
However, weightlifting regulations specify that when a tie occurs the gold goes to the lightest competitor. In yesterday's match that lifter was Columbia's Maria Isabel Urrutia, 73.28kg. Ruth Ogbeifo, 74.2kg, from Nigeria won the silver, leaving Kuo, 74.52kg, with the bronze.
"Although I didn't get the gold medal I am glad I got the bronze," Kuo said, a 25-year-old from Pingtung.
Kuo lifted 107.5kg in the snatch competition and 137.5kg in the clean-and-jerk.
Kuo, who has competed in weightlifting since she was in junior high school, was uncertain about whether she would compete in the next Olympics.
"I will compete in the Asian Games, but if I am to compete in the next Olympic Games? I don't know, I will have to see," she said.
Kuo is the second competitor representing Taiwan to win a medal in the Sydney Olympics. She will be awarded NT$4 million for taking the bronze.
Taiwan awards its Olympic athletes generously with a gold giving athletes NT$10 million, silver NT$6 million, and NT$2 million for placing fourth.
On Monday Li Fengying (黎鋒英), a former weightlifter for China who now lives in Taiwan and trains with her husband and coach Chung Yung-chi (鍾永吉), won the silver in the 63kg weightlifting competition.
Li's win was a first for women weightlifters in Taiwan and the first since 1984 when Tsai Wen-yi (
Meanwhile, the International Olympic Committee announced yesterday that Bulgarian weightlifter Ivan Ivanov would be stripped of his silver after he tested positive for drug use.
The IOC ordered the Bulgarian team to withdraw Ivanov's silver medal and diploma awarded after he tested positive.
A new medals ceremony will be held later in the week, the IOC said Ivanov's withdrawal from the results of the men's 56kg competition will mean that Taiwan's Wang Shin-yuan (
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