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Twelve years of Minginfel golden dominance in Olympic style weightlifting at Pacific Games

Palikir, Pohnpei (FSM Information Services): September 6, 2011 - Manuel Minginfel, from Yap, Federated States of Micronesia, set Pacific Games records by winning 3 gold medals in the men's 62 kilogram (KG) men's weightlifting competition held at Mont Dore, New Caledonia on Monday evening September 5.

Minginfel lifted 115 KG in the Snatch and 150KG in the Clean and Jerk for a total weight of 265KG. He easily beat the other 6 lifters in his weight division winning by over 15KG. Minginfel has a long history of representing the FSM at the South Pacific Games, now called the Pacific Games winning gold medals at the 1999 Guam South Pacific Games, 2003 Fiji South Pacific Games and 2007 Samoa South Pacific Games.

Minginfel will remain in New Caledonia and train at the Oceania Weightlifting Center under famous weightlifting coach Paul Coffa. In early November, he will travel to Paris, France to compete in the 2011 IWF World Weightlifting Championships attempting to qualify for the London 2012 Olympic Games.

The FSM has one of the smallest delegations of athletes at the 2011 Pacific Games competing in Athletics, Swimming, Basketball and Weightlifting with 17 athletes. Minginfel (weightlifting), Debra Daniel (swimming) and Keitani Graham (wrestling), through the FSM National Olympic Committee, have been awarded $28,000 London Olympic Games Athlete Scholarships to train and try to qualify for the London Olympic Games. Daniel is attending Iowa Central College in the USA mainland under a swimming scholarship and Graham has been training in Minnesota, USA with the USA greco-roman wrestling team. He will compete in the 2011 FILA World Wrestling Championships in Turkey later this month.

FSM is 6^th in the overall medal standings out of 22 island countries and territories at the Pacific Games in New Caledonia.