Sarah Davies goes for weightlifting glory at the Euros - again!
Reigning champion Sarah Davies will have a target on her back when she attempts to claim a second successive gold medal at the European Weightlifting Championships, in Batumi, Georgia, next week.
The 33-year-old Preston powerlifter claimed her first Euro title last year when she emerged victorious in the 64kg weight classification in Chisinau, Moldova.
After lifting 96kg in the snatch to place sixth, she came out on top in the clean and jerk with a top lift of 127kg.
Her combined score of 223kg was enough to claim gold - the first time she had finished on top of the podium at the Euros.
It means she will be one of the competitors to beat when this year’s competition gets under way on Sunday.
However, it will be slightly unknown territory for the former Garstang High School pupil as she is competing at 63kg.
The current Commonwealth Games champion admits that she is unsure how she will fare at the slightly lesser weight category.
Although she has won European silver in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, in 2021 at 64kg to go alongside her gold last year, the rest of her medals - including gold at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, in Birmingham - have been at a higher weight category such as 69kg or 71kg.
“It’s hard to say how I will do,” Davies told the Lancashire Post. “We have had a change in weight classes over the course of the last 12 months.
“I don’t really know who is going to turn up at the Europeans in that weight class.
“I would definitely say that I’m a podium favourite but I am just not quite sure who else will be there and who I will be up against.”
Davies revealed that she does not have a particular favourite in terms of the weight class she competes at, although believes the lesser classification arguably favours her more these days.
In a further twist, after this summer’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, the weight classification is going to change again.
“I have to work a lot harder to get down to the lighter weight class,” she added.
“That gives me a different challenge but it probably favours me in terms of the competition that I have.
“I am probably more comfortable at that class but after the Commonwealths, we’re going to have another change.
“I am probably going to have to go back up to 69kg because the lighter category is 61kg and my body is not made to be that light.
“I actually fit pretty perfectly between the lighter and heavier categories so it just depends on the competition and what I believe my goals are when it comes to choose which category I compete in.”
Preston-born and a former member of Garstang Gymnastics Club where she was a child prodigy, Davies hails from the village of Bilsborrow.
Very much proud of her roots, she said: “Home will always be home no matter where I end up in the country or in the world, I always route my way back home.
“To be able to represent my home town and Lancashire - it’s always good feeling.”