Coffa confident of lifters winning gold in Australia

Sports

By HENRY MORABANG
OCEANIA weightlifting super coach Paul Coffa is confident that PNG will win three gold medals at next year’s Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia.
Coffa, who accompanied the three Pacific Mini Games gold medal winning weightlifters, Steven Kari, Dika Toua and Morea Baru home on Monday for a three-day-break, did not hesitate to predict three gold medals for PNG.
Coffa is the secretary-general for the Oceania Weightlifting Federation and the coach for Oceania Weightlifting Institute in Noumea, New Caledonia, where he trains Pacific Island lifters including those from PNG.
He said he would not predict three gold medals if he was not confident.
“All three are in line for gold medals as there are no other countries in Commonwealth that have three lifters as Papua New Guinea does,” Coffa said..
“These are your (PNG) three gold medal winners and are the best athletes in the Pacific Mini Games at the moment and they would go on give their best at the Commonwealth Games.
“Morea Baru broke the 20-year-old Oceania record and he is currently ranked sixth in the world and will be number one in Gold Coast, come next year.
“The same goes for the prodigal son of weightlifting, Steven Kari.
“He made a right return to win three gold medals, making him the number one to win a gold in his weight division next year while recent performance by Dika Toua at the Mini Games, placed her as the hot favourite in her category.”
Coffa thanked Trukai Industries for bringing the three super athletes home to spend three days with their families in Hanuabada village, National Capital District, before heading back to Noumea to prepare for the Commonwealth Games.
Trukai Industries general manager–sales and marketing Andrew Daubney said the homecoming celebration coincided with the official announcement of Trukai’s media campaign supporting the Papua New Guinea weightlifting programme in preparation for the 2018 Commonwealth Games.
“Our media campaign ‘Living PNG for Gold’ centres around our support and commitment to our weightlifters’ campaign to lift more gold for PNG in the Commonwealth Games,” Daubney said.
The media campaign will involve all mainstream media and online media channels to rally support for weightlifting in the four months leading up to the Commonwealth Games in April in Australia.
Dika Toua, on behalf of six Noumea-based weightlifters and the Papua New Guinea Weightlifting Federation, thanked Trukai for their continued sponsorship of the sport.