The eyes of Australia’s best weightlifter Eileen Cikamatana welled up. “I owe my life to him,” she said, referring to veteran coach Paul Coffa. Then the tears flowed, over her lower eyelids, wiped quickly away by hands with thumbs still taped. “I’m pretty disappointed not giving him a medal.”
Coffa has worked with the two-time Commonwealth Games gold medallist for the best part of a decade, from their time at the Oceania Weightlifting Institute in New Caledonia through her move to Australia and starting a new life in green and gold.
The goal was always an Olympic medal, so finishing fourth in the 81kg division in Paris hurts. How it played out, even more so. “I was so confident she should have won a medal here, no question, but it’s just things that happen in competition,” Coffa said.
In the snatch component on Saturday at the South Paris Arena, the Fiji-born Australian had just lifted 117kg for a PB and an Oceania record, and was well-placed in equal third going into her stronger clean and jerk. She laid a foundation with a simple 145kg, but then when the weight went up to 149kg – still 3kg short of her best – things went awry.
“I said, before we started, [with] 151kg we were in silver or bronze,” Coffa said. “The idea was to take 149kg [with her second lift] and then sit down and look for the weight that we wanted. It didn’t happen.”
Cikamatana found it hard to explain. She said she wasn’t sick. That she wasn’t nervous, despite it being her long-awaited Olympic debut. “I had a good session in the snatch but then just dropped the ball in the jerk,” she said. “The coach did a great job of selecting the weights, they knew what to do but it was just me. I didn’t deliver the job and do what I was supposed to lift.”
Norway’s Solfrid Koanda soared ahead, recording an Olympic record on the way to the gold, tallying 14kg more than the Australian. Egypt’s Sara Ahmed finished second, and Ecuador’s flag bearer Neisi Dajomes was third, even though she appeared to faint in one clean and jerk attempt. Cikamatana ended up 5kg further back.
“I think she knew the medal was there, and that, I think, upset her,” Coffa said. “I think she should have just, ‘go there and do the lifts and forget about medals’.”
The Australian had lifted more in a World Cup event in March, and she is aware of her personal bests. But she said she hadn’t come in with a target weight in mind. “I don’t actually put goals in my mind when it comes to competition because Paul does all the work. I just came prepared, but then didn’t deliver the last few seconds, it was my fault.”
So tight is the bond, the pair have said they wouldn’t want to continue without the other. “We’ve got a very close relationship,” Coffa says. “Like a daughter to me and without that bond, you’re not going to produce the results.”
There was speculation Coffa, now in the 80s, would want to step down after Paris. Cikamatana said he wouldn’t let him. “No one can coach me the way he does, so looks like I might pull him back.”
She now plans to compete in her homeland at the Commonwealth Weightlifting Championships in Suva next month, and then the World Championships in December in Bahrain.
But the pain of Saturday is unlikely to disappear anytime soon. “All I wanted was to give him back a medal but I didn’t deliver, which is the most heartbreaking part of it,” she said. “But, ah, that’s life. That’s all I can say.”
