Second Online World Cup Series kick off

Athletes can submit their videos to the new edition of the online competition until 24 May 11 May 2020

A female powerlifter preparing to lift the bar

ⒸHiroki Nishioka for World Para Powerlifting

By World Para Powerlifting

The Online World Cup Series presented by BIGSER continues with the second of the five tournaments of the inaugural season starting on Monday (11 May).

Colombia’s Fabio Torres and Russia’s Vera Muratova are the ranking leaders following their victories in the men’s and women’s categories in the first Series.

The Online World Cup was designed by World Para Powerlifting to keep athletes active and motivated during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The online competition is really good as it looks like a real event and it pushes you to get a great result, helping athletes to remain strong. I enjoyed it,” said Torres.

The Nur-Sultan 2019 World Championships bronze medallist was one of the four Colombian powerlifters to join the first Online World Cup, alongside Jainer Cantillo, Francisco Palomeque and Aura Cristina Poblador.

As the Colombians, lifters from all over the world can submit videos competing from home to World Para Powerlifting through an online platform until 24 May. The same platform is used by officials to judge the athletes’ attempts.

The Online World Cup also includes a virtual competition with four captains drafting a team of two female and two male powerlifters. Teams score points for each athlete's individual performance.

Mexico’s three-time Paralympic champion Amalia Perez won the first edition as captain of Team Blue.

Perez’s squad included three Kazakh athletes, Raushan Koishibayeva, Rakhmetzhan Khamayev and Aline Solodukhina, together with Italy’s Donato Telesca.

The other three captains are Egypt’s Paralympic champion Sherif Osman (Team Red), Italy’s national team head coach Alessandro Boraschi (Team Yellow) and Brazil’s Pedro Meloni (Team Green), World Para Powerlifting head of competition.

Athletes earn points at each Series. The overall ranking leader at the end of the season will be awarded a bar from World Para Powerlifting partner Eleiko.

You can follow the second Online World Cup Series on World Para Powerlifting social media pages on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.