ANAHEIM, United States, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- Host athlete Harrison Maurus broke the jinx for the United States as he won the country's first weightlifting world medals in 20 years with two bronzes in men's 77kg at the world championships held in Anaheim, California on Saturday.
Maurus, 17, claimed bronze in both the clean and jerk and total with 193kg and a total of 348kg apiece, earning Team USA's first men's weightlifting world medal since Wes Barnett earned clean and jerk silver and total bronze in the 108kg in 1997. Barnett was 27 when he won his medals. The US had not medaled at worlds in either gender since 2005.
Maurus never expected to become one of the world's best weightlifters. In fact, he was busy dedicating his life to gymnastics until he gave weightlifting a shot in 2013.
Just four years later, Maurus has proven to be the weightlifting superstar the US has been waiting for.
"That's pretty cool," Maurus said of ending the drought. "I'd heard the numbers before, but it didn't connect. That was cool."
"I could not be more proud of the kid," coach Kevin Simons added. "I've been working with him since he was a little boy, since he was 10 years old. To see him become one of the greatest American weightlifters of all time is surreal. It's amazing."
"I knew he could be good when he was pretty young," Simons said. "When he was 11 years old, squatting 100 kilos, weighing 40."
While Simons knew Maurus had potential, he wasn't quite prepared for him to win world medals on the senior stage at age 17.
"I don't think anyone could have predicted that," Simons said. "I had full confidence in him from the beginning. But to do something so remarkable, I don't think any of us saw that coming."
Egypt's Mohamed Mahmoud swept the three gold medals with a total of 361kg, while Rejepbay Rejepov of Turkmenistan took overall silver with 352kg.
With the clean and jerk lift of 193kg, Maurus set a new youth world record, beating the previous record of 192kg he set in April this year.
Maurus also set senior American records in both the total and clean and jerk on Saturday. The total record had stood for 17 years since two-time Olympian Oscar Chaplin set it in 2000 with a total of 342.5kg.
Competing at his first senior-level worlds, Maurus continued a string of success that first saw him win silver in all three events at the 2016 youth world championships, followed by gold in total and clean and jerk, plus silver in snatch, at the same event a year later.
"There are more and more kids in the US training weightlifting, I believe the sport will become popular one day in future," added Maurus.
Simons noted that Maurus will likely move up to the 85kg class.
"We've got our eyes on the 2020 Olympics," Simons said.
