Weightlifter Clarence “CJ” Cummings Jr., 21, will compete for Team USA in the 73-kilogram weight class in the rescheduled 2020 Tokyo Olympics. A native of Beaufort, South Carolina, Cummings trains at The Foundry, a local gym. Cummings got his start in the gym because he watched his older sister, Crystal, work out. This was before he was a teenager.
C. Cummings Jr Olympic Games Tokyo 2020
Cummings won medals at official weightlifting contests when he was just 12 years old. He placed second in the 56-kilogram division in the 2012 American Open Weightlifting Championships. In the nine years since then, he has won four consecutive Junior Weightlifting World Championships and set nearly two dozen American records across four different weight categories at both the youth and senior levels (2016-2019).
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Tokyo’s Rivalry
Each of the 73-kilogram competitors for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics is listed below.
Roster of People Weighing 73 Kilograms
- Albania, Briken Calja
- Australia: Brandon Dean Wakeling
- Bulgarian politician Bozhidar Dimitrov Andreev
- Shi Zhiyong — China
- Spanish scholar David Sánchez López
- Indonesian President Rahmat Erwin Abdullah
- Japan’s Masanori Miyamoto
- President of Saudi Arabia, Mahmoud Mohammed Alhumayd
- Morocco’s Abderrahim Moum
- The Republic of Moldova (Marin Robu)
- The Mexican government is led by Jorge Adan Cardenas Estrada.
- A native of Tunisia, Karem Ben Hnia
- To quote the American citizen Clarence Cummings Jr.
- Jlio Reben Mayora Pernia de Venezuela
Shi Zhiyong of China, who won gold in the 69-kilogram division at the 2016 Rio Olympics, is the heavy favourite in this group heading into Tokyo (the IWF approved new weightlifting categories in 2018). All three world records in the 73-kilogram class are held by him, and he has won three IWF World Championships (2015, 2018-19) and four Asian Championships (2012, 2016, 2019, 2020).
Records for 73-Kilogram Weight Class
Weight: 169 kilos (Snatch) (372.9 pounds)
Clean and Jerk: 198 lbs (436.5 pounds)
Sum total: 363 kg (800.3 pounds)
Zhiyong has already demonstrated his ability to break the clean & jerk world record by lifting 199 kilogrammes at the 2020 Chinese National Championships. The only other competitors in the 69-kilogram division who placed in the top 10 at the Rio Olympics and are currently competing in Tokyo are fifth-placed Briken Calja and tenth-placed David Sanchez Lopez.
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Last Words
The weights that Cummings has lifted to date in competition are lower than those he has achieved in training for the Tokyo Olympics. Considering the other competitors in the 73-kilogram class at Tokyo, Cummings has a good shot at bringing home a medal for the United States.
If he wants to challenge Shi Zhiyong for the gold medal in weightlifting, he will likely have to achieve his personal best.
