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Olivia Reeves led the United States to its first Olympic weightlifting gold medal in 24 years on Thursday, winning the women’s 71kg (157lb) competition.
Reeves set an Olympic record in the snatch on Friday, lifting 117 kg (258 pounds). In total, she lifted 262 kg (578 pounds) to beat Colombia’s Mari Leivis Sánchez and Ecuador’s Angie Paola Palacios Dajomes to take the gold.
The last American weightlifter to win gold was Tara Nott-Cunningham at the 2000 Sydney Games. It was the first Olympics in which women’s weightlifting competed. Earlier this week, the American men won their first weightlifting medal since 1984, with Hampton Morris taking bronze.
Reeves, 21, is a student at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and began lifting weights as a teenager at her parents’ CrossFit gym. She previously won a gold medal in the 71kg category at the 2024 IWF World Cup and bronze at both the 2023 World Championships and Pan American Championships.
“It’s incredibly exciting because she’s having all this success and she’s having it at such a young age,” said former Olympic weightlifter Cara Heads Slaughter. He told NPR“She’s on her way to becoming the greatest American female weightlifter in history.”
