KONYA: Nooh Dastagir Butt couldn’t repeat his Commonwealth Games performance at the Islamic Solidarity Games.
The Pakistan weightlifter had rewritten the record books at the Commonwealths in Birmingham earlier this month when he lifted a total of 405kg to take gold in the +109kg final but was a distant fourth at the Islamic Games in Konya on Monday.
His total of 378kg saw him miss out on a podium finish with Tokyo Olympic champion Akbar Djuraev of Uzbekistan taking gold with a lift totalling 446kg.
Iran’s Alireza Yousefi (411kg) took silver ahead of Hojamuhammet Toychyyev of Turkmenistan (409kg).
After lifting 162kg in the scratch, Nooh could only manage 216kg in the clean and jerk.
His brother, Hanzala Dastagir Butt, finished sixth in the 109kg competition with a total of 329kg.
That event was also won by a weightlifter from Uzbekistan with Ruslan Nuridinov lifting a record total of 417kg.
Over in the pool, Pakistan’s Jahanara Nabi and Bismah Khan finished sixth and eighth respectively in the women’s 100m freestyle final.
Jahanara clocked a minute and 2.06 seconds while Bismah’s time was 1:03.03. Turkey’s Ilknur Nihan Cakici won gold in 57.20 seconds.
Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2022
