A 19-year-old South African weightlifter, Jonathan Trumble, has returned home, bringing with him a silver medal from the Commonwealth Weightlifting Championships in Ahmedabad, India.

The competition saw the young athlete step onto a platform that, by his own admission, felt overwhelming – the stage brighter, the audience larger, and the competition tougher than anything he’d faced. Yet, despite the pressure of the junior category, he proved his calibre against the Commonwealth’s best.

“Competing at the Commonwealth Championships was honestly surreal,” Trumble recalled. “Winning silver was an amazing feeling, but at the same time, it left me hungry for more because I knew I was just 2kg away from gold.”

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This near-miss has acted not as a disappointment, but as a catalyst, validating his place among the elite and giving him a fierce drive for the future.

His ascent to the podium has been swift. Starting in CrossFit, he switched to dedicated weightlifting in 2023 after his coach spotted his unique talent with the barbell.

Within eight months, he was at his first Commonwealth Championships, where he secured a bronze, a moment he calls his turning point.

The recent event brought a technical high point in his 150kg clean and jerk, a lift where ‘everything I had worked for came together,’ yet it also taught him a crucial lesson: “I learned that composure is everything. One small mistake can cost you on the big stage.”

Trumble’s journey is made tougher by the fact that weightlifting is a self-funded sport in South Africa, meaning he has to balance intense training and a job to cover the substantial costs of international travel.

He insists this adversity only makes his eventual success more rewarding, all while relying on the unwavering support of his family, friends, and coaches, who ‘believe in you when you doubt yourself.’

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Beyond his own goals, Trumble dedicates his time to coaching, particularly with adaptive athletes.

This began with helping a friend, Darren Thomas, who uses a wheelchair, and has grown into training him for events such as the Hyrox Games.

This experience has broadened Trumble’s perspective, teaching him patience and creativity, and offering a potent reminder: “Seeing my athlete push through adversity reminds me that excuses don’t get you anywhere.”

Looking ahead, while the South African Championships in November are his immediate focus, his long-term ambition is to compete at the Commonwealth Games as a senior and continue to represent his nation on the world stage.

From a high school enthusiast to an international medallist, Trumble is proving that talent, backed by a strong work ethic and support system, ensures the weight of expectation is nothing but fuel for the journey to gold.

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