Defending champion Salimikordasiabi, often referred to as “Salimi”, set a new world record of 216kg in the snatch to lead Talakhadze by 1kg going into the clean and jerk.
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As with every other weightlifting gold medal which has been handed out over the past ten days, the Snatch lifts came first, with each of the lifters having three attempts to lift varying weights straight from the floor to an overhead position in one single motion.
But he could not complete any of his three attempts on the clean and jerk.
Salimi was left furious with the jury after it over-ruled the judges’ decision that his second lift had been legitimate. Salimi appeared to disagree with the judges’ ruling on his first two tries and didn’t have the energy to complete the third.
While being warmly applauded by Iranian and many other spectators, Iran’s super-heavyweight weightlifter waved his hand at the judges to express his disagreement with their ruling before leaving the stage with nearly tearful eyes.
Much to Iranians” chagrin, President of the International Weightlifting Federation and a member of the International Olympic Committee Tamás Ajánthe, who was standing near the judges’ table all through the event and had witnessed Salimi’s attempts, merely responded to the protest of Iranian reporters who accused him of forcing the jury to reject Salimi’s lifting with a “goodbye!’ remark.
The biggest men in the sport of weightlifting thrilled the crowd, before Lasha Talakhadze from Georgia became Olympic champion with a combined winning World Record weight of 473kg over the Snatch and Clean and Jerk sections of the competition.
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His closest challenger, Armenia’s Gor Minasyan, totalled 451kg, with Irakli Turmanidze (448kg) taking bronze for Georgia. However, the 26-year-old fell out of medal contention as he failed three times at 245kg in the clean and jerk.
