Raymond Cavileer drew my attention to the 100% Raw Powerlifting Internet Meet held last weekend (23 November). The idea was to synchronize two meet locations (East coast and West coast) over the internet and to set an official 100% RAW World Record at the same time. They had official equipment and real judges at both ends. Unfortunately, the internet connection failed at the East coast end, but Raymond tells me they will redo it. Apparently, they also have a web site in the works.
It's great to see an official powerlifting federation take serious steps towards leveraging the internet as a platform for meets. I don't know the details, but presuming the idea was to have lifters from both locations in the same rounds and live footage streamed over the internet, I think the idea is brilliant. If they end up committing to this concept long-term, we may perhaps even see 100% RAW championships regularly distributed over several locations? That would be good both for the lifters and the spectators who only need to travel as far as the nearest meet location (this is indeed the main motivator for why 100% RAW started this and here our two projects touch base although coming in from different angles). The idea of this going down over several locations and seeing the other ones on a screen would also add a very exciting dimension to the meets.
I don't know what happened on the East coast, but the West coast location in Yorba Linda, California went ahead and held theirs as a local meet. Apparently, only one lifter was in attendance, namely 78-year old World-record holder Robert Cortes, but he was all the more impressive posting an amazing 402.5lbs (182.6kg) at a bodyweight of only 151.6lbs (68.8kg). Here is the video:
The Barbell Company also posted a
news story about the event.
I'm going to be following this with interest and wish
100% RAW all the best in making this a great success.
