USAWA

By Al Myers

The second IAWA Merit Award of the night was awarded to Steve Andrews of England.  I have known Steve for many years, and have had the fortunate opportunity to share the platform with him several times at IAWA competitions.  Steve has always been a very complete All Round weightlifter, and is a technician in all lifts.  There’s really no lifts that he is not good at, and he ALWAYS places in the top when the points are calculated.  Past IAWA President Steve Gardner helped me out with Steve’s presentation, and gave his induction speech and presentation.  Steve G summed up Steve A’s IAWA resume perfectly, and gave a very moving speech which I would like to share in this blog.  Here it is, by Steve Gardner:

A little about Steve Andrews – 38 / 39 years in weightlifting by Steve Gardner

In 1979 Steve joined a night school for weightlifting in order to lose weight, later in 1980 he was introduced to the BAWLA All Round Scheme. (in the days before our drug free all round lifting organisation had begun) Steve, who was in his 20’s and had never been involved in sports, was surprised how much he loved the new challenge. At the Leicester club Frank Allen was always an inspiration to Steve, who also improved his ability by watching some of the other excellent technicians in all round weightlifting.

The rest is history, this multi-title winning British Champion especially enjoys his Single Arm lifting and is proud of winning the ‘best Single Arm’ title for many, many times over the years. Steve is proud of all his records and hopes to carry on lifting for as many years as his body will allow!

So Steve was lifting in All Round Weightlifting when we formed our International organisation way back in 1985, and without exception (I think) he is the only person who has lifted consistently throughout the last 33 years, even operations on elbows and stuff like that hasn’t kept him away for any lengthy periods, he is like the energiser battery bunny, he just keeps going and going. A competitor at Internationals abroad on occasions too, Steve has not missed many IAWA(UK) National events in all those years. Steve has been a referee for many years, and is always supportive and helpful to new lifters at events, always offering to help out with loading and whatever other tasks arise. Steve has become involved in the Committee work in more recent years, having held position as UK Chairman for some years now. Steve has also been active in supporting Frank Allen in running events and keeping the Leicester Club alive for many, many years too.

All in all, Steve’s dedication and unfaltering support to our beloved sport of all round weightlifting and all of those people involved therein is recognised as being outstanding, and deserving of the highest Award IAWA can present …the IAWA Award of Merit

Ladies and Gentleman I give you ‘Steve Andrews’