Trinity Barbell Club were wrongly awarded victory at this weekend’s intervarsity championships, after a scoring error from the Irish Powerlifting Federation (IPF). The title has now been awarded to University College Cork (UCC), who originally finished second.
Captain of the club’s powerlifters, Rachel Knight, and coach, Dav Barisas, were informed of the error last night, in an email sent by Rob Burke, Vice-President and National Team Manager of the IPF and seen by The University Times.
Burke explained that the error arose “due to two lifters who missed weight for the -63s [63kg class] and thus were listed as guests but in the -72s [72kg class]”. The two lifters, Amy O’Sullivan of UCC and Clodagh Greene of NUI Maynooth, should have been listed as guest lifters, and not placed in the 72kg class.
Under the scoring system used at the IPF University Championships, categories featuring six or more competitors are scored differently from categories featuring five lifters or fewer. Twelve points are awarded to the winner of a category in which six or more athletes are competing, with nine points awarded to the runner-up, eight points to the third-place finisher, and so on. In classes in which five athletes or fewer are competing, nine points are awarded to the winner, seven to the runner-up, six to the third-place finisher and so on. The best five lifters from every club are awarded points.
For Trinity Barbell, the error meant that, in terms of points gained, Elaine Kelly was the club’s top lifter, earning 12 points. Aoife O’Sullivan, who came first in the 63kg class and was awarded best female lifter over the weekend, earned nine points, with Áine Flanagan also being awarded nine points after finishing second in the 72kg class. Hannah Treanor and Will Wood received eight points each. Trinity Barbell’s initial overall score was 46 points, one point ahead of runners-up UCC.
However, after recalibrating the scores, the IPF deducted points from Kelly, Flanagan and Treanor, who all competed in the 72kg class. Kelly’s score fell from 12 points to nine points, Flanagan’s score fell from nine points to seven points and Treanor’s score fell from seven points to six points. After the adjustment, Treanor was no longer one of the club’s top five lifters at the championships.
Eloise Duffy, who received seven points after finishing second in the 84kg class, was added to Trinity’s top five lifters in Treanor’s place.
After the resulting amendment to the scoring, Trinity Barbell were left with a final tally of 40 points, five points behind UCC, the reigning champions before the weekend. Trinity ultimately finished second, ahead of third-place Dublin City University (DCU). O’Sullivan was not stripped of the title of best female lifter.
In the email, Burke apologised “to the entire Trinity Barbell team on behalf of the Irish Powerlifting Federation”.
“I am sorry for giving you cause to celebrate and then bringing this bad news.”
The IPF also apologised on its Facebook page, saying: “Well. We fucked up.”
Burke told The University Times over email that the IPF has “made changes to our results calculations and verification procedures to ensure this does not happen again”.
In an email statement to The University Times, Knight said: “Although it’s obviously a little disappointing for the team, I’m still incredibly proud of how we performed. We never imagined we would place at intervarsities this year, so even coming second is a huge achievement for such a young club.”
