Olympics: Kazakh Rahimov lifts world record for men's 77kg
Nijat Rahimov smashed the clean and jerk world record by four kilogrammes to stun Chinese superstar Lyu Xiaojun and grab gold at the Olympic Games.
Kazakhstan's Nijat Rahimov smashed the clean and jerk world record by four kilogrammes to stun Chinese superstar Lyu Xiaojun and grab Olympic gold in the men's 77kg weightlifting in Rio Wednesday.
Rahimov lifted 214 kg to add to his snatch score of 165, making a combined total of 379.
That was the same total as Lyu but Rahimov won by virtue of being lighter.
Lyu, wearing gold shoes, had broken the snatch world record earlier and was well ahead of Rahimov going into the second stage but could only manage to jerk 202 kg.
Rahimov's sensational lift came with an attempt to spare and after Lyu had finished all of his, meaning there was no way back for the London 2012 champion.
It was Kazakhstan's first weightlifting gold of the Games and sparked wild celebrations amongst their coaching staff at the Riocentro 2 Pavilion.
Kazakhstan's involvement in the weightlifting had been in major doubt in the run-up to the Games due to a number of high-profile positive doping cases.
The IWF, which issued blanket bans to Russia and Bulgaria, had warned that the Kazakhs could face the same fate.
But the International Olympic Committee was unable to complete re-testing of samples from the Beijing and London Games in time, freeing Kazakhstan to compete.