[Source: Team Fiji/Facebook]

Team Fiji weightlifter Zion Tokona says it has been a hard but rewarding journey so far in his young career.

The 16-year-old broke the Oceania Youth record in the men’s 96kg clean and jerk at the 2023 Pacific Games in the Solomon Islands.

He broke the previous Oceania Youth record of 147kg with a lift of 150kg.

Tokona says he did not expect to achieve such results so soon, given that he only took up weightlifting a year ago.

“I started training just last year, in May. It’s only been about a year and a few months since I started my journey in weightlifting but it was a very hard journey because I went to a lot of training camps this year and it has really helped improve my lifts at a very rapid pace.”

Tokona says he aims to learn as much as he can during such important events in his quest to qualify for the Commonwealth Games and eventually the Olympic Games one day.

Click Here for more on Pacific Games