Featured Image: REUTERS/Stoyan Nenov
From squash to beach volleyball to football and swimming; Egyptian female athletes have been dominating the Egyptian sports scene locally and internationally for the past year. 18-year-old Sara Samir has now added weightlifting to that list as she recently deservingly won the Bronze Medal at the Rio2016 69 kg Weightlifting Olympics event. However, the sacrifices she made to reach this point and her previous weightlifting accomplishments are worth mentioning and discussing so that we can fully appreciate her win.
“Samir chose to postpone taking her final exams earlier this year so she can take them at the second exam rounds. This was all in order to train and prepare for the Olympics”
Samir, who is now going through her 3rd year of High School, chose to postpone taking her final exams earlier this year so she can take them at the second exam rounds. This was all in order to train and prepare for the Olympics. The sacrifice paid off. However, she was informed upon her arrival in Rio that she won’t be able to take the exams during the second round as they finish on the 20th, yet she is scheduled to arrive to Egypt on the 18th, “I hope to pass this year; third year of high school was really hard, and I’ve been studying a lot and taking lessons, so I really hope I can manage taking the exams”, Samir said in a live phone call interview during Ma’a Shubair on Sada Al Balad.
“In 2014, she became the first Female Egyptian to win an Olympic medal on the youth level, when she earned the Gold medal at the Youth Olympics Games (YOG) in Nanjing, China”
This bronze medal made Samir – who totaled 255kg at the event – the first Egyptian female to ever win an Olympic medal, and the first Egyptian to win a weightlifting medal since 1948, where Egypt won 2 gold medals and 1 silver medal. In the last snatch, clean and jerk she had to do to win the medal, she was carrying 143 kg, which as she said in the interview, was a weight she had never carried before. This isn’t her first win, though. In 2014, she became the first Female Egyptian to win an Olympic medal on the youth level, when she earned the Gold medal at the Youth Olympics Games (YOG) in Nanjing, China. That same year, she won 6 gold medals from the African Youth and African Junior Championships.
“I gift this medal to Egypt”, said Samir referring to her bronze win. We hope that Egypt can gift her in return the chance to finish her 3rd High School year and take the exams; for all the history-making achievements she’s been stacking up for Egypt in the past few years.
