
We are thrilled to have the opportunity to speak with Brian Oliver, a prominent media figure who has made a name for himself in the world of Olympic weightlifting. As a seasoned journalist and author, Brian has covered some of the most high-profile weightlifting events in the world and has interviewed countless weightlifters, coaches, and officials throughout his career.
As someone who typically asks the questions, Brian, we are interested to know what it’s like to be on the other side of the interview. What do you like about this role reversal and how do you approach being the object of someone else’s questions?
No problem at all – I’m sure your questions will be better than mine! It did not happen so much in past years, but if I visit a country that wants to host future events their media (and sometimes their government) will ask for an opinion. Because I speak to a lot of athletes, coaches, ITOs, federation officials and journalists, I have a reasonable idea of how things are going. In Yerevan at the European Championships I was asked to do six interviews on camera – mainly because Armenia is bidding to host the IWF World Championships next year. I was happy to say how well the hosts organised the competition, to highlight the welcome sight of large crowds, and to point out the problems with the flag-burning incident before the competition started. And I could also say how much I enjoyed the food (and occasional drink). Armenian cognac was definitely a ‘good lift’.
You’ve had a distinguished career covering Olympic weightlifting. We’re interested to learn about your background and how you initially became involved in the sport.
First a confession – I have never lifted a barbell, and at my age, and with my dodgy shoulders and a golf career (strictly recreational) to protect, I doubt I ever will. I do not pretend to be an expert in the areas of kinesiology, training programmes and so on, but I do have a lot of experience in the media, I know something about promoting a sport, and I am very keen to ‘humanise’ athletes who can often just be a name and a series of numbers. All weightlifters have an interesting story to tell (Solfrid Koanda being a qualified electrician – how good is that?) but barely anybody tells them. My favourite stories in Armenia were not only Lasha, Karlos Nasar and Kamila Konotop but also athletes from Ireland and Greece, Tham Nguen and Theodoros Iakovidis, plus the return of Portugal. You don’t always have to be on the podium to promote weightlifting with good news.
I got started by chance, really. I left my role as sports editor at The Observer, the oldest Sunday newspaper in the world, in 2011 after a wonderful job turned bad when another paper took over The Observer because of the financial recession in 2008. I agreed with London 2012 that I’d work for them but they had to find a role, and it ended up being weightlifting media manager simply because I mentioned that I had been at the famous Suleymanoglu-Leonidis session in Atlanta in 1996.


Working at the London Olympics in 2012, where some of the most exciting weightlifting competitions in recent memory took place, was one of the highlights of your career. Could you tell us about your memorable moments and what it was like to work at such a prestigious event? How did you feel, in particular, when we discovered, after a few years, that the results were tainted by doping?
I would never have stayed in weightlifting if London 2012 had not been so good. Massive crowds, great atmosphere, unbelievable performances (literally unbelievable, as we discovered a few years later).
My role was media manager, employed by the Organising Committee, so I was at every session, every press conference, and worked 16 hours a day but who cares, it was fantastic.
The press conference memories include Ilya Ilyin saying the secret of his success was horsemeat (nobody tested the horse), Om Yun-Chol’s homage to his esteemed leader, and my favourite was Zhou Lulu after she won the women’s super-heavyweights. A journalist said (whether true or not) that lots of people in China thought Zhou did not look very ladylike so what was her reply. She said, “OK, you might be better looking, but how many Olympic gold medals do you have?”
The atmosphere when Salimi won the men’s super-heavyweights was great, even though a lot of the crowd had been sent along by the Iranian embassy in London to make political chants.
Another fond memory was taking my son and daughter along. They loved it, as did all the respected journalists I knew who came along to report on a session not knowing what to expect. In Britain I have never met anybody, ever, who went to a weightlifting competition for the first time and came away thinking anything other than, “Wow! That was great!”
Britain may not win lots of medals but it certainly puts on a show, as I know from personal experience at London 2012 and (Commonwealth Games) Glasgow 2014 and Birmingham 2022. I was going to retire from weightlifting after Birmingham (too many years of relentlessly bad news) but Jo Calvino and her team put on such a great show, and so many IWF board members were there to see it, that after talking to them (especially Antonio Urso, who invited me to the World Championships in Colombia), I stayed on and have never regretted it.
As for the 2016 bad news about the retests, I had been in the sport long enough not to be shocked. Everybody knows doping will never be eradicated, but if it happened in a year or two from now, if the Tokyo results lost dozens of lifters to disqualifications, I definitely would be shocked.
Weightlifting has evolved significantly throughout the years. What are your current opinions on weightlifting, and how has the sport changed since you first started covering it?
The biggest change before I started was welcoming women into weightlifting and the biggest change (apart from attitudes to doping) since has been welcoming women from the Islamic world into the sport. The change to regulations regarding the athlete’s uniform has made a huge difference: more than 700 female lifters in Saudi Arabia now when there were none a few years ago. What a shame Iran’s government blocked the team competing in Albania at the World Youth Championships. The Iran team was 50-50 male and female, which is remarkable.
On the subject of training methods I do not consider myself an expert – but it’s great that rather than just the Bulgarian method or Soviet method we now have Italian, Chinese, Colombian….
The old ways are not necessarily the best, especially in a clean sport.
Also, attitudes to children learning how to lift weights are changing. There was so much nonsense talked about in the past, but now the science is winning and people know that learning good technique and lifting weights is very good for you, at all ages.
What do you believe are the greatest difficulties facing weightlifting in the future, and what actions should be made to assure the sport’s continuous expansion and development?
Such a big question… To paraphrase, humanise the athletes, modernise the sport, keep it simple, change the way it looks, kill or fill the dead time between lifts, don’t be scared of innovation, cut back the number of officials (elected or otherwise) in certain areas, keep a closer check on coaches, put the athletes first.
Of course some athletes are too young, some are not so well educated, but they need a much bigger voice than they have now and so do the coaches. Maybe a representative body of athletes and coaches combined would be an idea.
We’re interested in hearing your opinions on the recent 2023 EWF European Championships in Yerevan.
The start (or rather the opening ceremony before the start) could not have been more problematic, and the hosts took too long to condemn the flag-burning incident, which gave the politicians in Azerbaijan an opportunity to turn everybody’s attention away from the sport.
But that was resolved, and Armenia did a great job. The arena, the presentation, the size of the crowds (yes, too noisy at times when athletes were on the platform but it was their first major championships and they can/will learn next time), the training venue, warm-up room, food, accommodation, transport… If you put the athletes first and ask their opinion, they loved it. Some of them made a bad mistake in skipping the closing ceremony because they have attended so many duds. It was outstanding.
And what a surprise to see a press area full to overflowing. I had to get there early to claim a seat – quite often at other championships I could take all of them.
You’ve had the chance to speak with some of the top names in weightlifting, including Olympic medallists, world and European champions. Can you tell us about an athlete that made an effect on you or a particularly memorable interview experience?
Without doubt the most remarkable weightlifting character I have met is Precious McKenzie, who is now in his 80s. I could go on forever but, short version: his dad was killed by a crocodile, he nearly died as an infant when his internal organs were visible through a hole in his chest, he nearly drowned in a pit of human excrement, he was the best weightlifter in South Africa but could not compete because of apartheid, he moved to Britain and became a favorite of Queen Elizabeth II and the Royal Family, and he was the first athlete in any sport to win four straight Commonwealth Games gold medals.

Of current lifters there are many whose stories I like – Solfrid the electrician, Eileen Cikamatana, Cyrille Tchatchet, Maude Charron, Hidilyn Diaz… and one I met last week, the only weightlifter in Timor Leste, José Garcia. Read more here.


How do you envision media coverage of weightlifting developing? Do you foresee any emerging trends or technology that will alter how followers of weightlifting read about and watch the sport?
I have worked all my life (nearly 50 years as a journalist) in the written word, but I know the trend now is for bite-size videos and the attention span of younger ‘consumers’ of the media is very short. The written word will always be important for passing on basic information (what’s the point of watching a video if you haven’t read anything about the athlete?) but I realise I am what you might call ‘old-school’.
It was very interesting to hear what happened in Norway this year, regarding live and video coverage of the national championships. The livestream audience has dropped by nearly half in five years but a new daily highlights video released at 20.00 – managed by a professional – had 47,000 views. Last year that number (when not managed by a professional) was 676. Very revealing.
Mdia coverage is a very interesting topic. It’s not entirely clear who is media and who is something else (selling clothing, subscriptions, coaching, other equipment) at a competition. It is organic and I wouldn’t like to predict how it will all turn out. But I will say that the EWF website has moved to another level recently, and if the IWF, EWF and other federations can employ professionals to take more control of media output, they will surely benefit.
In today’s digital age, a strong social media presence can make all the difference. There has been much more activity on EWF social platforms, producing new and exciting content that highlights the amazing achievements of the weightlifting community. From your perspective, what do you think about EWF’s social media presence now? Is there anything you particularly like or think could be improved?
The EWF has moved to another level in this respect recently, and if the IWF, EWF and other federations can employ professionals to take more control of media output, they will surely benefit.
The team and individual photos related to entries and results at the European Championships are excellent – lively, colourful, and looking straight at the viewer. More short videos of winning lifts or great saves would be good, also some action from the training hall – the sort of thing that appears on other social media outlets but maybe with some EWF branding. Money is always tight in weightlifting but I honestly believe if EWF invests in a tech-savvy media professional to handle this sort of thing, it will benefit by bringing in a bigger audience, attracting sponsors, and creating a closer relationship with the athletes. I’m sure the recent improvements make the athletes feel a more important part of the EWF than they did before.
I particularly liked the team-by-team displays in the build-up to Yerevan. What I don’t like, on any existing weightlifting site, is the results service. Too many clicks to get to what you want, one site is different from the next, results are sometimes missing, and as for the IWF results database… well, just don’t ask.
Brian, we sincerely appreciate you taking the time to speak with us today. Hearing your opinions on weightlifting, your experiences covering the sport, and your outlook on the future of weightlifting media has been tremendously enlightening. Your enthusiasm for the activity is clear, and we value the contributions your reporting and coverage have made to the weightlifting community. In the years to come, we hope to read more of your work and wish you the best of luck in your future undertakings. Gratitude again for being here with us today.
EWF Secretariat