Zoe Smith

Career Early career Smith won the South East County Championships, her first major competition. During 2008, she set national records 98 times across junior and senior classes, ending the year holding all junior and senior records for the 53 kg weight category other than the clean and jerk. At the age of 14 she was the second-ranked UK female weightlifter, behind only two-time Commonwealth champion Michaela Breeze. alt=Three women wearing sporting medals raising their hands. Smith (right) at the medal presentation ceremony at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, where she won the bronze medal. Ranu Bala Chanu Yumnam won the gold medal, and Seen Lee took the silver. Aged 15, Smith finished sixth at the 2009 European Junior Championships (for competitors up to 20 years old), a result that John Goodbody of The Sunday Times wrote "provided further evidence of her immense potential". In October 2010 she won a bronze medal in the women's 58 kg division at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India, her first senior international competition, to become the first Englishwoman to win a Commonwealth Games weightlifting medal. She was shortlisted for the 2010 BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year award. In December 2010, British Weight Lifting paused her £550-a-year funding, Her funding was reinstated in February 2011 after what British Weight Lifting described as "positive changes".

2012 Olympics and following years In May 2012 Smith was chosen to represent Great Britain at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.

After winning bronze at the 2014 European Weightlifting Championships in April, lifting 204 kg, she won the gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in July, lifting a total of 210 kg. Competing at a major event in the 63 kg category for the first time, Smith finished ninth at the 2015 World Weightlifting Championships. By August 2016, Smith held four British clean and jerk records spread across three weight classes. She missed being selected for the 2016 Olympics following a shoulder injury that she incurred at the 2015 British Championships.

Since 2018 Around 2018, Smith relocated to the Midlands and, having paused her education while training for the 2012 Olympics, joined Loughborough College to study for A-levels in biology, psychology, and environmental science. He described how her shoulder injury, the end of centralised funding for weightlifting in the UK, and the loss of Smith's sponsors, had led to Smith moving back in with her parents and taking a job as a barista.

At the 2018 Commonwealth Games, Smith took the silver medal in the women's 63 kg category. She reached her target, and was selected. and eighth in the Women's 59 kg category at the Olympics in July of that year, two places higher than she had finished in 2012.

At the 2023 European Weightlifting Championships she won the gold in clean and jerk and the bronze in the 64 kg total category. She retired from the 59 kg competition at the 2024 European Championships after failing a snatch. At the 2024 IWF World Cup, in the 64 kg category, Smith lifted 85 kg in the snatch and 113 kg in the clean and jerk, but this was not enough, at her last opportunity, to secure a place at the 2024 Summer Olympics.

Coaching and preparation She was coached by Andy Callard. He also coached her sister Yana Smith for weightlifting at the London Youth Games. In a 2013 piece for The Times, Smith wrote that she liked to eat pizza before the start of competitions, wore make-up during events to help her feel good, and would order more pizza immediately after competing. Smith, Giles Greenwood and Fraer Morrow founded the East London Weightlifting Club, where Smith coaches.

Media appearances Smith was a guest on the BBC One quiz show Question of Sport in 2012, 2014, and 2023. She featured in British Olympic Dreams on BBC One in 2012 and alongside fellow weightlifters Hannah Powell and Helen Jewell in Girl Power: Going for Gold on BBC Three the same year. Later in 2012, she spoke on BBC radio and television about dealing with critical comments regarding her not conforming to a typical physique. She has been a guest on Ace and Vis (BBC Radio 1Xtra, 2012), Phil Williams (BBC Radio 5 Live, 2015), The Danny Baker Show (BBC Radio 5 Live, 2015), and Jessica Fostekew: Sturdy Girl Club (BBC Radio 4, 2023).

Major competition results

+Junior and Youth results for Zoe Smith 2009 Junior UK 2009 Youth UK