Ri Song Gum secured North Korea’s opening gold with a record-breaking performance, while Mirabai Chanu earned her first Asian Games medal in Japan.
North Korea’s Ri Song Gum won gold in the women’s 49kg weightlifting event after setting three world records, while India’s Mirabai Chanu finished second to claim her first Asian Games medal.
The victory gave North Korea its opening gold of the Nagoya Games and placed Ri among just four weightlifters to have won three Asian Games titles.
The 28-year-old raised 94kg in the snatch, the competition’s opening discipline, surpassing the previous world record of 93kg by 1kg.
Ri then broke the clean-and-jerk world record twice, lifting 116kg and then 121kg overhead. The 4ft-7in (139.7cm) athlete combined those efforts with her 94kg snatch.
Her winning total of 215kg exceeded the former world record by 7kg.
Ri became the first woman—and only the fourth weightlifter overall—to win three Asian Games gold medals. The others are Iran’s Mohammad Nassiri, who won between 1966 and 1974, South Korea’s Kim Tae-hyun from 1990 to 1998, and Iran’s Behdad Salimi from 2010 to 2018. No athlete has yet won four weightlifting golds at the Games.
Chanu achieved her first Asian Games medal on her third attempt. She had previously won silver in the women’s 53kg category at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.
The 32-year-old is India’s most decorated weightlifter, with three Commonwealth gold medals and a silver, as well as multiple world titles.
Chanu produced a combined total of 198kg, lifting 87kg in the snatch and 111kg in the clean and jerk. Indonesia’s Diana Tri Wijayana earned bronze with 191kg, made up of an 88kg snatch and a 103kg clean and jerk.
Chanu’s silver ended India’s 28-year wait for an Asian Games weightlifting medal, dating back to Karnam Malleswari’s silver in 1998.
