Latest News 2

European Championship 2006 Austria - Irish Team Results

July 2006

In the Powerlifting event Tommy Dillon took 1st place in the 82.5kg M60-64 cat. and broke 4 World Records for squat, bench, deadlift and total. Pa McNamara also won first place in the 90 kg Open cat. and now holds the World Squat Record with 330 kg. Shane Brodie took 2nd Place to Pa McNamara, but lifted well considering he is suffering from a back injury.

In the Bench Press only event Tommy took 1st place again with a bench of 142.5 kg. Next up was Owen McCaffrey in the 82.5 kg Jun cat. he finished in 2nd place with an impressive new Irish record of 192.5 kg. Then Kevin Pierse lifted in the 90 kg Open cat, he placed 1st in the category with the most amount of lifters that day. Jason Quirk had another 1st place for Ireland a new World Record in the 110 kg Jun cat. with a bench of 221 kg. In the 140kg+ Open cat, Garry Kirwan took another Gold with a bench of 205kg

Well Done to all the lads and to Ger Halvey who once again did an outstanding job as Team

Manager, and also a thanks to Team Coach, Tommy Dillon for all his hard work.

IPO National Benchpress Championship 2006

September 2006

This years competition was hosted by the IPO Leinster Rep, Bernard Delaney, at the Hercules Club in Dublin and the awards were very kindly sponsored by SP Securities. Bernard ran a great competition that was very well organised and attracted a number of new IPO members including entrants from Belfast and Lithuania. We were also very pleased with the turn-out especially considering that a lot of the more experienced lifters are saving themselves for the upcoming World Championships in November.

There was some impressive lifts on the day and a number of new National Benchpress Records were set. The Best lifter competition was very tight with only a fraction of a point between Terence Flood and the winner, Vytautas Lalas. Terence from Dublin lifted in the Master 60-65 90Kg category and set a new record with 135kg while Vytautas of Lithuania lifted an impressive 225Kg in the Open 125Kg category.

A special thanks to JJ Dunne of SP Securities who sponsored all the awards. Thanks also to the platform crew, Dave Smyth & Chris Murphy and to the referees Ben Hartigan, Bernard Delaney and Shane Brodie. We would also like to welcome the new members to the organisation and thank all the entrants who travelled to Dublin for the competition.

All lifters have qualified to lift at the WPF World Benchpress Championship in November.