16 Year Old Peter Musa Wins School Age Championship

PR Log (Press Release) – Jun 24, 2009 – Sixteen year old Peter Musa, of Price Township, PA won his 5th School Age Championship in Olympic-style weightlifting. Competing in the 69 kg weight class, Musa finished out his school age years in weightlifting with personal records in the snatch, clean and jerk and total. He also set new school age records, won his weight class, and won the over all award for his age group. In addition to that he won the best male lifter award for the entire competition.

Musa snatched 113 kg (248.6 lbs) and clean and jerked 143 kg (314.6 lbs), making a total of 256 kg (537.6 lbs), exceeding his personal best by 4 kg and beating the school age national records in both lifts and in the total.

“Peter does an unusual technique in the clean and jerk,” commented his coach, Joanne Musa, “He does a squat jerk instead of a split jerk. Most weightlifters don’t have the flexibility and the strength in their shoulders to be successful with this technique, but it’s worked out well for Peter,” she added.

Musa, a student of Excellence Academy in Mount Pocono has been a competitive weightlifter for 6 years. He started the sport of weightlifting at the tender age of 10, under the tutelage of his mother, Joanne Musa, also of Price Township, and her coach Peter Roselli, of Frenchtown, NJ. He originally started weightlifting to make him stronger and more powerful for other sports. But his early successes in weightlifting lead him to give up football and lacrosse to concentrate on weightlifting year round.

Last month he competed in the first Youth World Championship in Chiang Mai, Thailand where he placed 19th out of 32 of the best young weightlifters in his weight class in the world. His next major competition will be the 17 and under Pan American Championships in Chile in September, were he hopes to win his weight class.