Asian Indoor Games; Women's Wrestling Gold and Breaking Weightlifting World Record

In the ongoing Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games hosted by Turkmenistan, Iran's delegation has won 19 gold medals. Zahra Yazdani secured the first gold medal for Iranian women's Alish wrestling and stood on the top podium in the classic Alish competitions. Yazdani had previously won a silver medal in belt wrestling, making this her second medal in these competitions. In the final of the women's classic Alish 55 kg category, Zahra Yazdani defeated Mudyanova from Uzbekistan to claim the top spot. She hails from Mazandaran and grew up in a wrestling family, being the niece of Reza Yazdani, a world champion in freestyle wrestling. Previously, in Pahlavani wrestling, Iranian men had won three gold medals through Mohammad Naderi, Arash Mohammadi, and Ahmad Mirzapur. In weightlifting competitions, Sohrab Moradi, the Rio Olympic champion, managed to break the world total record. Moradi, competing in the 94 kg category, recorded a total of 413 kg, improving the world total record by one kilogram. The Iranian weightlifter set a new world total record with lifts of 185 kg in the snatch and 228 kg in the clean and jerk. This record was previously held by Kakhiashvili from Greece, set in 1999. After Kakhiashvili, Ilya Ilyin from Kazakhstan had broken this record, but due to a positive doping test, his medals and records were annulled. The head coach of the Iranian national weightlifting team commented on Moradi's record-breaking, stating that if breaking records was our only goal, he wouldn't have attempted the third snatch lift and would have rested. Mohsen Biranvand further mentioned that they aimed to break the world total record in the second clean and jerk attempt. In the medal ranking table, Turkmenistan leads with 77 gold medals, having won a total of 193 colorful medals so far. Iranian athletes have secured 19 gold, 15 silver, and 43 bronze medals. Uzbekistan, Thailand, and China each have 16 gold medals, while Kazakhstan's delegation has also won 15 golds. Japan has yet to win a gold medal and is tied for 31st place with two bronzes. In this context, the prohibition of female wrestlers due to 'preserving Islamic values' and the recognition of the value of medals won by Iranian female athletes is highlighted. A female Iranian referee stated that wrestling is the primary sport of 'Iranians', meaning both men and women. After 25 years, negotiations have begun for the participation of girls in wrestling in Iran.