The Malta Drug-Free Powerlifting Association organised its annual National Powerlifting Championships last Sunday, 9th September. 25 athletes competed in this sport consisting of three attempts in three lifts: the squat, the benchpress and the deadlift. Maria Debono won the overall female lifter out of six others registering a double body weight 102.5kg squat, a 62.5kg bench press and managed to pull a 137.5kg deadlift. Tamasin Mallia and Maria Qvarnstörm came second and third and competed in the -63kg and -53kg category respectively. Sonia Brahmi and Annette Micallef Arnaud were newcomers to the sport while Rachel Ann Said competed for a second time and bettered her place in the national rankings by gaining 207points at 46kg bodyweight.

Charles Degiorgio, who competed in the -75kg category, was the male National Champion for the 2018 edition and he managed to squat a heavy 200kg, press a bench of 120kg and grinded a deadlift of 240kg. Looks like Matteo Aquilina is recovering well from a year and a half injury as he took second place and registered great numbers overall. Josef Spiteri had the biggest bench press of the day with a national record of 175kg and this won him a third place overall as he got a bigger total than the other competitors.

There have been 11 new lifters to the sport of powerlifting during this competition. Mirco Greselin, an Italian national, has impressed many as this was his first time competing with the Maltese powerlifting association and came first in his category for the under 82.5kg. Johann Spiteri who has been competing in powerlifting for a good number of years came first in the -100kg category competing against 3 other lifters. Juan Fenech and Josef Curmi are still teenagers but have registered promising lifts and the Powerlifting community in Malta will definately be seeing more of these young lifters in the near future. Kurt Degiorgio, weighing under 60kg lifted a total of 377.5kg and this has in fact won him first place from all the under 23 years of age lifters competing in the national championships. The heaviest lifter of the day, Cleaven Cutajar registered the biggest total of the day with 665kg. Cutajar has in fact broke a national record for the deadlift with a 270kg.

More than 10 athletes from the Malta Drug-Free Powerlifting Association have qualified to compete and represent Malta this November in the World Full Power Championships in Scotland, Glasgow within the World Drug-Free Powerlifting Federation. In fact most of these athletes did not compete during the nationals so that they can truly prepare their training cycle for the biggest powerlifting event of the year. After the World Championships, the Malta Powerlifting will be hosting the last event of the year and will be organising the first ever National Single Lift Championships in early December, where a lifter can compete solely in one particular lift.