Weightlifting at any age
Yvon Matte (on the right with the red collar) during his first competition in Rouyn-Noranda in 2015.
Just returned from a World Masters Championship in Florida, where he won a silver medal, weightlifter in his seventies from Pointe-aux-Trembles Yvon Matte tells Métro his experience and maintains that the country's population has everything to gain by practicing this sport, regardless age.
The competitions for Masters are reserved for weightlifters who have reached a certain age and who cannot participate in the Olympic Games. The 76-year-old has been competing since 2015, and has been weightlifting for almost a decade now. “I started weightlifting at 67,” says Matte. I was quite a skilled athlete in bodybuilding, and when my son started weightlifting, I accompanied him in his training and I realized that I loved it.”
Participating in competitions since 2015 and having won several prizes, including the silver medal in 2019 at the World Masters in Montreal, the weightlifter explains that this sport is a real remedy for staying healthy for a long time if we rely on the advanced age of several competitors.
“It is a sport that people of all ages can practice since it allows a complete development of the human body without significant risk of injury in addition to developing character traits. I am a respiratory therapist and specialist in cardiopulmonary exercise physiology, and the scientific literature agrees: weightlifting is a sports discipline that complements all others and improves results.”
Promote weightlifting in the country
For Yvon Matte, the important thing, beyond his medals and trophies, is to make this sport known and to encourage its practice, especially among young people.
“Weightlifting n t is not highly valued in Canada unlike other sports, especially hockey. It’t took time before there were success stories in this discipline, and it’s started to develop in the 1980s with some athletes. Today, we have Maude Charron and others, but there is still work to be done.”
In this regard, Yvon Matte wishes to set up an international weightlifting show in Montreal to bring together those who practice this sport. “We want to hold a national weightlifting show in Montreal on the history of the discipline and where athletes from everywhere will be invited. This idea took shape a few weeks ago when we were talking together, several weightlifters and me, during our competition in Orlando. I wish it would be more popular, especially with young people, so people can do it and be healthy longer.”
