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By Keiran Gorsky
For a young athlete, weightlifting starlet Rory van Ulft has done a great deal of waiting. Barred from competitions, national and international, due to age restrictions, even as she outlifted older peers, her 13th birthday could hardly have come soon enough.
Her long-awaited trip to Cali, Colombia for the 2026 IWF Youth World Championships finally imminent, van Ulft set her sights not only on sweeping the women’s 48-kilogram division, but setting world records for the under-18 age group.
Sure enough, the practically unbelievable phenomenon of such a young girl able to lift so much, previously witnessed many times in Ottawa, at last got to show itself on the world stage. And when van Ulft flew back home earlier this month, she returned with a long-awaited trio of gold medals in tow, and as the official owner of two U18 women’s world records (for her 95 kg clean and jerk lift and 162 kg total).
“It feels amazing to get a new record. I’m just really happy,” van Ulft said, calling it a successful day, before adding, “I did miss the snatch record, so that’s still out there for me to go get next time.”
Van Ulft’s long-time coach Spencer Moorman, himself a seasoned competitor and a winner of five U.S. national titles, did his utmost to project an aura of confidence at his first World Championships as a coach rather than a participant.
“I was really trying to play it cool,” he laughed. “I feel like [it’s] one of my jobs.”
Just as van Ulft was being called out for her opening snatch, though, it was the mountainous Moorman suddenly racked with an unexpected nervousness. He’d been doing this all his life, and he’d held firm and was reassuring even as van Ulft and her parents began to fret as her numbers lagged late in the lead-up to the competition.
Sweating in that wet, eternal summer, van Ulft stepped out with unflappable confidence. And soon, every reservation subsided. After a long lead-up rife with fun and consternation in equal measure, the recent middle school grad showed the world what she has long been capable of, and departed with her name etched in history.
An endlessly long time coming, it’s no surprise that van Ulft and her team started early on their competition prep. As Moorman notes, three to four weeks of intense training ahead of competitions already puts tremendous strain on even the most experienced weightlifters.
In van Ulft’s case, ‘peak period’ came a full six weeks in advance. Even though she boasted a double-digit advantage in lift total over the next closest competitor, she was intent on making Youth World Championships a statement competition. Compounding her still-active gymnastics schedule and an adolescent’s social life, the Frank Ryan Catholic Intermediate School graduate’s calendar has been hectic.
“This kid’s life is pretty much booked up to the hour and sometimes to the minute of what she’s going to do from day to day,” Moorman indicated.
Though she isn’t always bursting with energy, her commitment to her craft can hardly be questioned. Van Ulft has always been wise beyond her years but her receptiveness to new ideas from new sources further sets her apart.
In addition to Moorman’s guidance at Iron Hex Weightlifting in Little Italy, van Ulft has benefitted from an enviable caliber of strength coaches in her corner. In recent years, she has had the opportunity to train under Coach Jianping Ma – a former Olympian and an architect of China’s current weightlifting dominance.
More recently, van Ulft had the opportunity to reacquaint herself with European champion Oleksiy Torokhtiy, proudly perusing her comically large collection of medals and trophies. The Ukrainian had visited van Ulft six years earlier and had been keenly monitoring her progress ever since.
In an extended tour of her house and home gym, van Ulft discussed her approach to training, her hearty diet and her outlook on all that lies ahead. Her rapid ascension has left her, in a sense, without real peers to speak of. So often, the only one to beat is her past self.
“Instead of thinking about the people I’m against, I think about being against myself and my main goal is to just do the best that I can and try to beat what I’ve done before,” she told Torokhtiy.
13-year-old plots path to L.A. 2028 Olympics, through Aruba
Van Ulft had eagerly been awaiting this year when she became eligible for U18 competition, and the next big birthday she can’t wait for is her 15th. That’s when she’ll be allowed to compete at the senior level, and it’s also an Olympic season, which she has squarely in focus.
Van Ulft was able to compete in June’s Canadian junior (under-21) championships, which she won with a 166 kg performance. Her mark was also better than her weight class’s winning total posted at May’s senior nationals (which included a local competitor celebrated for her successes on the other end of the weightlifting age spectrum).
Read More: Reaching first weightlifting nationals at age 42 a huge win for Ottawa mom
In the Sinclair rankings (which compares athletes’ performances across all weight categories), that would have placed her 10th overall among senior women’s competitors.
With very few qualification positions available within Canada and globally in the sport, the path to an L.A. 2028 remains a large challenge, but van Ulft’s team feels her odds will be improved by representing Aruba.
Read More: L.A. 2028 Olympics a target on the horizon for 12-year-old weightlifter Rory van Ulft
Van Ulft wore the Caribbean island’s colours at the youth worlds, and she plans to start learning Papiamento, the Creole of the Dutch Caribbean, “probably online, because there aren’t many people that teach Papiamento,” she explains.
Van Ulft hopes to have more time to dedicate to her extracurricular pursuits next school year when she enters John McCrae Secondary School’s high performance athletics program, which allows for individualized timetables and flexible attendance.
As every success raises the stakes higher, the level of competition threatens to take some of the joy out of competing. Smiles strain to be seen over those contorting twitches and grimaces that come with lifting gargantuan weights.
Moorman feels that his most important job is to stop that from happening – to keep practice fun. As fatigue and anxiety set in approaching the Youth World Championships, Moorman tailored his feedback to be more positive. Given her exceptionally early start in the sport, Moorman has always needed to think outside the box to keep engagement high – she might not be a little kid anymore, but there’s always time for a little monkeying around.
As van Ulft stepped out to attempt her first lift in Colombia, Moorman shook off his own nerves and reminded himself of how much work had gone into this. Maybe it took too long to get there, but he also figured it was inevitable.
“Proud’s not the right word,” he considered. “It actually almost felt easy.”
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