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The Asian champion Hoang Anh Tuan who won a silver at Olympic 2008 failed at this SEA Games. In men’s 56 kg class, having lifted 128 kg in the snatch, the weightlifter failed to lift 152 kg in the clean and jerk. This is the second consecutive time the athlete has not succeeded at the SEA Games arena.Vietnamese fans were disappointed when Olympic silver medallist Hoang Anh Tuan failed to win gold in the men’s 56kg category yesterday.

The 24-year-old athlete was philosophical about his loss and put it down to errors of skill and bad tactics. The gold went to Indonesia’s Jadi Setiadi.

“I’m broken-hearted. This is my third consecutive failure at the SEA Games. I don’t know what to say except sorry to the people who put their hopes on me,” said Tuan, who sometimes trained without a coach.

“Tuan is a high-level athlete. He can completely adjust his weight level without the need to refer to a coach. In fact, domestic coaches probably wouldn’t have made a difference,” coach Pham Danh Ton conceded.

Tuan was expected to cruise to victory in this event, which he missed out on in the previous Games in Thailand two years ago. The gold was won by Eko Irawan Yuli of Indonesia who also won a bronze medal at the Beijing Olympics.

Tuan’s hopes were further raised when his key rival Eko competed in the 62kg division after his success in the recent World Weightlifting Championship. This left Tuan with an apparently easy task.

In the training sessions in Laos, Tuan, who won two gold medals in the men’s 56kg category at the Asian Weightlifting Championships, held in Kanazawa, Japan last April, often lifted a combined total of 280kg.

However, in yesterday’s competition, Tuan lifted 125kg at the second attempt of the ‘snatch’ discipline, while his main rival, Jadi of Indonesia, bettered him by 1kg.

Turning to the clean and jerk category which is Tuan’s strong point, Tuan’s opening weight was 152kg (heavier than Jadi by 7kg) but he failed at all three attempts. Jadi eventually succeeded in lifting 148kg.