By Joshua Stewart
The SBD World Log Lifting Championship saw glory on the south coast as national and world records alike were broken on a historic day at Central Hall in Southampton.
The women’s event kicked the event off and Bournemouth’s Lu Dudley had the honour and pressure of performing the first lift of the day in front of the formidable referee, four time world’s strongest man Zydrunas Savickas.
The Lithuanian, ‘known as Big Z’ oversaw Lu reach a personal best of 65kg, winning her category of under 63kg and ensuring that a native athlete was on the podium.
Lu only joined the sport after someone who saw her compete in powerlifting suggested that she join a competition in log lifting. “I was originally a power lifter but someone said to try this out and I entered a competition for fun but ended up winning it. I then went to the England Qualifiers and that got me in.”
Having travelled from Bournemouth to compete, Lu was thankful that the competition wasn’t further afield.
“If I had qualified for the world championships that were being held in another country there is no way I would be able to go. I just wouldn’t be able to afford it and there isn’t much funding at all. It is getting slightly better though as the women’s and smaller weight classes get more publicity so in a couple of years who knows.”
The competition saw strongmen and women travel in from Poland, Australia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Ireland and more as the roughly 60 spectators showed their appreciation for the effort being put on show for every single lift, regardless if it ended successfully or not.
Ireland and Lithuania saw national records broken in the Men’s open with 200.4kg and the Women’s under 74kg categories with 75kg respectively whilst Scotland’s Chris Harper broke his own world record in the under 80kg category with a lift of 147kg, having set the record of 146kg himself in February of this year whilst also suffering with a form of multiple sclerosis.
Slovakia’s Patrik Zelezka set a national record in the Men’s under 105kg category before then taking it a step further and setting a new world record of 193kg to round off a day of great performances.
