Small Edmonton-area gym becoming major hub for Olympic weightlifting

St. Albert gym churning out elite weightlifters Nearly half of Team Canada trains at the facility. CTV News Edmonton's Adam Cook has the story.

EDMONTON — Farm Strong Athletics is a tiny gym in St. Albert that specializes in Olympic weightlifting but it has three of the top junior athletes in Canada.

“We say it’s a small but mighty club,” said co-owner and coach Evan Taylor.

Gina McMonagle, Emma Friesen and Kalin Melnyk have all qualified for the Jr. Pan American Championships later this month. The trio makes up nearly half of Team Canada.

“I think if shows how good of a quality we have of coaching at our gym,” Emma Friesen told CTV News.

The athletes train six days a week under head coach and former national team member Dan Schultz and Evan Taylor, respectively.

“It’s really exciting for us to have three from Alberta going because that’s a lot. It’s a big deal and all from the same gym,” said McMonagle, who won gold in her weight class at Junior Nationals.

‘I’M KIND OF WORRIED ABOUT THE TECHNICAL ASPECT’

The Jr. Pan Am Championships were supposed to be held in Colombia but athletes will compete online because of COVID-19. That means coaches will be doing some heavy lifting of their own. They have to make sure that judges can see all the angles during competition.

“Instead of being coaches we have to be videographers as well,” said Taylor.

The online format is a concern for these athletes that have spent countless hours training in the gym.

“They (judges) could call a misslift because they didn’t see something,” added Friesen.

The Jr. Pan Am Championships run Nov. 26 and 27.