AFP, Tokyo :
Papua New Guinea’s Loa Dika Toua made history as the first female to compete in five Olympic weightlifting competitions on Saturday, just a few hours after carrying her nation’s flag at the Tokyo 2020 opening ceremony.
It was a remarkable achievement by the 37-year-old, coming 21 years after she became the first female ever to lift at an Olympic Games, when women’s weightlifting was first introduced at Sydney 2000.
The 12-time continental champion and mother of two, a national hero back in her home country, beamed a huge smile as she successfully hoisted 69kg in her first snatch attempt before forming a heart shape with her hands.
“It’s an amazing feeling,” she told AFP after finishing fourth in Group B of the 49kg bodyweight division, with a total of 167kg.
“Your dream is to go to one Olympics, and maybe a second one. But I never imagined in a million years that I would make it to five.”
Toua considered quitting the sport after she was diagnosed with tuberculosis in 2013 and almost died, but made an astonishing recovery to win Commonwealth Games gold at Glasgow 2014.
This might have been her sixth Olympic Games but she skipped Rio 2016 to spend more time with her children and give her sister Thelma a chance to lift at the Olympics, a dream that was dashed when Papua New Guinea did not send a team.
