Behdad Salimi’s biography, net worth, fact, career, awards and life story

Behdad Salimi Kordasiabi (Persian: بهداد سلیمی كردآسیابی‎‎, born December 8, 1989 in Ghaemshahr, Mazandaran) is an Iranian weightlifter in the +105 kg category. Salimi currently holds the world record in the snatch with 216 kg in his weight class.

Career

At the 2010 World Weightlifting Championships Salimi won the gold medal in the +105 kg category. Salimi won gold again in the +105 kg category at the 2010 Asian Games with a 205 kg snatch and a 235 kg clean and jerk.

Salimi won the gold medal at the 2011 World Weightlifting Championships in Paris, France on November 13, 2011, and set a new snatch world record of 214 kg.

Salimi became the 2012 Olympic gold medalist in the +105 kg category on August 7, 2012 with a 208 kg snatch, a 247 kg clean and jerk for a total of 455 kg.

Despite a torn ACL, total knee re-construction and over two years out of the game, Behdad Salimi returned to weightlifting in 2016 to compete in the Fajr Cup, held in Tehran, Iran and won gold.

Salimi made a weightlifting comeback, in the Rio 2016 Olympics, where he bettered his own world record in the snatch and completed a clean & jerk lift which was approved by all three referees before being controversially disqualified by the jury. Iran’s National Olympics Committee filed an application to the CAS. The International Weightlifting Federation website was hacked on the next morning and its Instagram page flooded with over 285,000 comments.

Leaving national team

After 2012 London Olympic games he and other Olympic medalists of Iran protested against Iran’s national weightlifting team head coach Kourosh Bagheri for using offensive language in training and declined to attend national team exercises. As a result of a heavy argument on a live TV debate between Salimi and Kourosh Bagheri, the Iranian Weightlifting Federation dismissed Salimi and other weightlifters, who later on sided by Salimi in public and did not invite any of the London medalists for the 2013 Asian Weightlifting Championships and 2013 World Weightlifting Championships.

Major results