Sri Lankan powerlifting champion Darin Weerasinghe took gold at commonwealth powerlifting championships held in protcherfstroom South Africa. Darin who was a member of a team of 9 that represented Sri Lanka had stiff competition from countries such as New Zealand, Great Britain, India, Pakistan and South Africa. Darin took part in the over 120kg open class and this has the strongest and largest lifters in the class with some of the British and South African athletes weighting well over 140kg. Being strategic in warm ups and lifting smart and going down right to the last lift Darin secured gold with a lift of 205kg in bench press. Darin had events back to back and secures a silver in the previous event.
The open raw powerlifting championship held on the next day saw a three weight battle with giants and Darin was facing competition from world champion Mathys Herbst the South African giant who weights 181kg. Keeping everyone on pins and going down to the final the more experienced Mathys got the better of Darin and won Gold while Darin took silver.
Darin is the only athlete from the team to enter 4 events and has successfully completed 3 with 1 gold and 2 silver’s. The final event will be on the 17th where he will be trying for a podium and to be the only Sri Lankan athletes to win 4 commonwealth medals.
Darin and the team train at High Octane Fitness and were sponsored by Mlesna , Audi Sri Lanka, Interblocks, UTE CAT and Specialised shipping services.