sports

There was a gathering to announce top ten players and coaches of the year 2022 of the DPRK at the Weightlifting Gymnasium on Chongchun Street in Pyongyang.

Ri Song Gum, weightlifter of the April 25 Sports Club, headed the list of the top ten players announced by Premier Kim Tok Hun who doubles as the chairman of the State Sports Guidance Commission.

“I am so delighted that I have been nominated as one of the top ten players of the country again this year after 2021. I will live up to the expectations of those who have supported me with better results,” said Ri.

She broke the world record twice in the women’s 49kg category of the weightlifting event of the national championships last year to obtain three gold medals to be rated as a best player surpassing the world level.

She was born in Nyongbyon County, North Phyongan Province, and began to learn weightlifting at the county juvenile sports school. Afterwards, she honed her skills at the Ryomyong and April 25 sports clubs.

In those years, she took part in over a dozen international competitions to notch up remarkable successes.

In particular, she won three golds in the women’s 44kg category of the 2014 Asian senior and junior weightlifting championships and established a new world junior record in jerk. This showed off the enormous potential for development of the newcomer.

Afterwards, she fully demonstrated her ability as an ace in several international events like the world weightlifting championships and Asian Games and bettered junior and national records on the home front.

“Her merit is that she trains assiduously by herself to complete the detailed technical movements as well as her daily training assignments. Such exact demand on herself has made her a weightlifting ace,” said Kye Song Il, weightlifting coach of the April 25 Sports Club.

A winner of Kim Il Sung Youth Honour Prize and Merited Athlete, Ri Song Gum has set her goals on world title and Olympic gold.