Wright’s dreams of Olympic double-duty still alive

Jamaican discus thrower and weightlifter Chad Wright is one step closer to a historic Olympic double as he aims to represent Jamaica in both sports at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games.

Wright, who was pleased with his performances at the recent Central American and Caribbean (CAC) Games, won gold in the men’s discus with a throw of 63.39 metres.

He followed up that gold-medal performance with a personal-best effort in the men’s +110kg weightlifting division, finishing fifth.

Speaking on his return to Jamaica, Wright said he was happy with his performances but believes he still has more to give.

“Going into CAC, I’m very happy with my performance, especially in the discus, and my performance in the weightlifting. It was a PB performance, but I felt like I could have done way more,” Wright said.

Wright, a two-time national men’s discus champion, has long established himself among Jamaica’s elite track and field athletes.

However, his venture into weightlifting, he explained, began out of simple curiosity.

Wright said the transition was a natural one as weightlifting had always been a key component of his training programme for discus.

“Initially, I wasn’t fully interested in it. It was a client at the gym at the time that had spoken to me, spoken to my boss, and then my boss got me into a training camp in Texas. From that training camp, I’ve been hooked,” Wright said.

“I’ve been doing weightlifting in my training for throwing, so it’s been tied into my programme this whole entire time,” he continued.

“We just made a shift, me and my coaches. We made a shift with my programme in terms of maximising how much I’m lifting every week for the weightlifting part of it.”

OLYMPIC AMBITIONS

With a dual focus on discus and weightlifting, Wright said he is aiming to represent Jamaica in both sports at the 2028 Olympic Games.

He explained that his immediate focus is on weightlifting as the qualification process is more demanding than that of discus.

“One of my main focuses now is for the weightlifting because it’s a bit more challenging to get the qualifying for it,” he said.

“In regards to the throwing now, I’m not too worried about the qualifying for it, up until trials. Trials is the really big, important meet for getting to throw discus at LA,” Wright said.

Wright is aware that the task ahead will be extremely difficult as no athlete has ever competed in both weightlifting and discus at the same Olympic Games.

He remains undeterred by the challenge and hopes to make history by achieving that goal.

“It would be a great achievement, and I know no one’s ever really fully done it.”

gregory.bryce@gleanerjm.com