India have won many medals at the Asian Games in the past and will continue to do so in the future. However, what Mirabai Chanu achieved in Nagoya at the Asian Games 2026 with a silver medal in the women’s 49kg weightlifting event was not just another medal, but the end of a 28-year wait. It was India’s first medal in weightlifting at the Asian Games since Karnam Malleswari won bronze in 1998. Before the 2026 edition, India had won 14 medals in weightlifting, comprising five silver and nine bronze.
With the Asian Games medal, Mirabai Chanu finally completed her medal collection.
The Tokyo Olympics silver medallist totalled 198kg, lifting 88kg in the snatch and 111kg in the clean and jerk.
The Asian Games silver adds to Chanu’s Olympic silver, three World Championship medals, including a gold, multiple Commonwealth Games and Commonwealth Championships titles, and an Asian Championships bronze.
Two-time world champion Ri Song Gum of North Korea, with a total of 215kg (94kg + 121kg), lived up to expectations, winning the gold with a record-breaking performance to complete a hat-trick of Asian Games titles.
Chanu opened with 83kg in the snatch before successfully clearing 85kg and 88kg with her next two attempts, finishing the first half of the competition in third place.
She then produced a best lift of 111kg in the clean and jerk to finally add an Asian Games medal to her collection after two previous near misses.
A Great Trophy Cabinet
A medal in Aichi-Nagoya completed Mirabai’s collection of medals in the three major multi-sport events – the Olympics, Asian Games and Commonwealth Games. Moreover, after Karnam Malleshwari, Mirabai became the second Indian weightlifter to win a medal in all major international weightlifting events; Olympics, Asian Games, Commonwealth Games, and World Championships Asian & Commonwealth Championships.
Mirabai has Olympic silver, a world title and three Commonwealth Games gold medals to her name, but the Asian Games podium had remained out of reach until Wednesday. At the 2014 Asian Games, she finished ninth on her debut. At the 2018 edition in Jakarta, she was forced to miss the competition due to injury. She appeared to have another opportunity in Hangzhou in 2023, only to finish a heartbreaking fourth after a thigh injury hampered her clean and jerk attempts in the final.
Three years later, Chanu returned to Japan, a country where she bagged her Olympic silver, and finally delivered the elusive Asian Games medal she had been chasing since 2014.
Her journey has been marked by setbacks as much as success. At the Rio 2016 Olympics, she failed to register a valid lift in the competition. Five years later, she responded emphatically at the Tokyo Olympics, winning the silver medal and establishing herself among the leading names in world weightlifting.
Chanu opened her campaign with an 87kg snatch and carried the same weight into her successful clean-and-jerk effort before finishing with 198kg overall.
The silver also extended India’s growing medal presence in Nagoya and brought an end to a 28-year wait for a weightlifting medal at the Asian Games.
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