Cook Islands Weightlifting Federation members are upskilling in a combined effort to attract more competition.

Twenty-one CIWF members attended a two-day conference on Rarotonga between Saturday and Sunday under the guidance of New Zealand weightlifting official Richie Wong.

They all achieved accreditation as national technical officials, as a result of workshop.

It is a much needed boost for weightlifting in the Cook Islands, CIWF president Teariki Puni said.

The technical official workshop was held at the Tumuora Fitness Box.

Wong coaches Olympic weightlifting for various ages from youth to masters and various levels from beginners through to international for Olympic Weightlifting New Zealand, and has been a competitive weightlifter since 2012.

Dr Puni said he was impressed with the turnout which would have continuing benefits for the sport in the Cook Islands.

Organisers initially anticipated 15 attendees.

Discussions centred around the roles and responsibilities of officials and what it takes to maintain international standards before attendees were required to conclude the programme with an exam.

“The important thing was to create a bassline for technical officials.”

It was a first for the Cook Islands, he added.

Technical officials were much needed here as high profile lifter and national coach Luisa Peters was the only qualified official prior to the weekend workshop, Dr Puni said.   

“It means we are upskilling so we have a good national base of officials and we can run more competitions, eventually we will be able to host international competitions.”

Dr Puni said there were three main pathways into the sport.

Athletes, technical officials and coaches.

He said CIWF was looking to host coaching workshops in the future.

Having multiple people qualified as technical officials would provide CIWF with a “succession plan instead of having reliance on one person”.

“It puts us in a good position, you have to start somewhere.

“Now we have 21 accredited technical officials, they can take part now, we only had one before.”

Dr Puni said interest was first raised at the 2020 Cook Islands Games.

“We had to officiate and we were short on people.”

He said CIWF is looking forward to hosting domestic competitions at the end of May.

“We will get an opportunity to put this stuff into practice.”

Last month, Cook Islands weightlifters who competed at the New Zealand International Weightlifting Competition returned home with medals.

Manine Lynch won gold medal while Jerome Tura managed bronze at the event held in Auckland, New Zealand.

Debutant Tura, who competed in the men’s under 81kg weight class on Friday, lifted 110kg snatch and a 140kg clean and jerk with a phenomenal 250kg total.

Lynch, who made a comeback after a lapse of five years, competed in the women’s 87kg plus.

Hitting an 86kg snatch and a 110kg clean and jerk with a 196kg total, she won gold.

The NZ event was the first international competition held in New Zealand since the 2017 World Masters Games, and served as one of the final recognised events for athletes seeking to qualify for the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.

The Commonwealth Games qualifying list from the New Zealand International event will be released this week.

Team Cook Islands delegation was led by Dr Teariki Puni (federation president), Luisa Peters (vice president and national coach), and Martin Stetka (executive member and manager).