Zoe Smith (born 26 April 1994) is an English weightlifter. 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 English woman to win a Commonwealth Games weightlifting medal. Smith competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London and finished 12th in the Women's 58 kg division. After missing the 2016 Summer Olympics following an injury, she finished eighth in the 59 kg at the 2020 Summer Olympics. At the 2023 European Weightlifting Championships she won the gold in clean and jerk and the bronze in the 64 kg total category. She failed to qualify for the 2024 Summer Olympics.
Smith took up weightlifting aged 12, when she was at a gym training as a gymnast and was invited to try lifting; she subsequently represented her borough at the London Youth Games. A few months after her victory at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, her funding was withdrawn as she was deemed to be insufficiently committed to the sport, but was restored a couple of months later. By 2018, a shoulder injury, the end of centralised funding for weightlifting in the UK, and the loss of her sponsorship, led to Smith moving back in with her parents and taking a job as a barista. Smith coaches at a gym in East London.
Early life Zoe Smith was born on 26 April 1994 to Nikki Smith, an administrator at the Department of Health and Terry Smith, a window cleaner. She attended De Lucy Primary School in Abbey Wood and Townley Grammar School for Girls in Bexleyheath. In 2005, aged 12, Smith was training at a local gym as a gymnast. Andrew Callard, who was forming a team for the London Youth Games, was in the building and was seeking female competitors for weightlifting at the competition. Smith and some of the other gymnasts tried squats, and, according to Callard, her potential as a weightlifter was immediately obvious. She took up weightlifting and represented her borough, Greenwich, at the London Youth Games.
Career Early career Smith won the South East County Championships, her first major competition. She was selected for the 2008 Commonwealth Youth Games, at which she was the youngest member of the English team, and won the gold medal in the 53 kg category. 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. In the 58 kg category, she held every record that she could as someone aged under 18. The British Olympic Association named her their Athlete of the Year for Weightlifting. At the age of 14 she was the second-ranked UK female weightlifter, behind only two-time Commonwealth champion Michaela Breeze.
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, arguing that she was overweight and not adequately committed to her training; her appeal against the decision was rejected. 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. She competed in the Women's 58 kg division and took the British record with a clean and jerk lift of 121 kg. With a snatch of 90 kg she was placed 12th in her weight class with a total of 211 kg.
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. She travelled for the 2014 World Weightlifting Championships, but contracted a virus and had to withdraw before lifting. Following the 2014 Commonwealth Games, Smith has said, she gained about 10 kg in weight, and having sometimes struggled to keep under 60 kg, she decided on a target weight of 63–64 kg. Competing at a major event in the 63 kg category for the first time, Smith finished ninth at the 2015 World Weightlifting Championships.
She took a bronze at the 2016 European 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. In 2018, Ben Bloom wrote in The Daily Telegraph that since 2014 Smith had become "a sporting nobody; a beacon of talent that faded away into a foggy memory of seemingly unfulfilled promise". 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. Smith described this time by saying, "It all became too much. I fell into a dark place and my mental health plummeted."
At the 2018 Commonwealth Games, Smith took the silver medal in the women's 63 kg category. Going into the competition with a back injury, she was permitted to have an epidural administration to reduce the pain. After a close contest with Mona Pretorius for second place, Smith prevailed, equalling Pretorius's lift of 115 kg in the clean and jerk after exceeding her lift in the snatch. Bloom commented that "it is time to update those career highlights" on Smith's Wikipedia article.
As UK Sport had decided to cut funding for weightlifting in 2016, Smith launched a crowdfunding appeal in July 2018, seeking to raise £10,000 to help her qualify for the 2020 Olympics. She reached her target, and was selected. She finished in sixth place at the 2021 European Weightlifting Championships (64 kg) in April 2021, 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. Callard nicknamed her "Pablo", after the Olympic gold medal winner Pablo Lara, who had a reputation for being lazy. 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).
Smith was a participant in the Channel 4 programme Time Crashers (2015), in which celebrities were placed in environments recreating specific historical times. In the first episode, which was in an Elizabethan-era setting, Smith cried as Kirstie Alley and Fern Britton were peeling the skin from a boar's skull.
Major competition results +Senior results for Zoe SmithYearVenueWeight Snatch (kg) Clean and jerk (kg) Total Rank123Rank123RankRepresenting Olympic Games2012 London, Great Britain 58 kg 90939313116121 1219211102020 Tokyo, Japan 59 kg 87 87 918 113 116 119 62008World Championships2015 Houston, United States 63 kg 949710011120124128922192018 Ashgabat, Turkmenistan 64 kg 9292951411712012015215 17European Championships2012 Antalya, Turkey 58 kg 8589924110116120420842014 Tel Aviv, Israel 58 kg 86869051141181182042016 Førde, Norway 63 kg 939698 4 11611911921542019 Batumi, Georgia 64 kg 92969861221261282242021 Moscow, Russia 59 kg 87 89 89 7 111 111 114 5 200 52023 Yerevan, Armenia 64 kg 90 93 95 5 119 121 122 214 2024 Sofia, Bulgaria 59 kg 84.0 – – – - - – –British International Open2019 Coventry, Great Britain 64 kg 91 94 100 120 125 130 225 IWF World Cup2024 Phuket, Thailand 64 kg 85 85 88 32 109 113 116 23 198 24Representing Commonwealth Games2010 Delhi, India 58 kg 8080854103106108188 2014 Glasgow, Scotland 53 kg 8992951121151182022018 Gold Coast, Australia 63 kg 879092110112115207British Senior Championships2010 Kilmarnock 63 kg 76 81 86 102 109 115 188 2012 South Normanton 63 kg 87 91 94 113 117 120.0 211 2014 Coventry 63 kg 83 86 88 104 108 112 200 2015 Coventry 63 kg 90 93 96 114 118 123 214 2016 Coventry 63 kg 92 92 - – - – – –2017 Coventry 63 kg 84 87 90 113 117 117 204
+Junior and Youth results for Zoe SmithYearVenueWeight Snatch (kg) Clean and jerk (kg) Total Rank123Rank123RankRepresenting World Championships 2009 Youth Chiangmai, Thailand 58 kg 70 74 75 8 89 92 94 9 169 8 2011 Youth Lima, Peru 64 kg 86 9193 105 110 115 201 European Championships2007 Youth Pavia, Italy 53 kg 54 58 60 9 67 70 72 12 132 102008 Youth Amiens, France 53 kg 64 – - 7 87 – - 151 52009 Junior Landskrona, Sweden58 kg 70 74 76 4 89 89 93 5 169 52009 Youth Eilat, Israel 58 kg 73 73 77 7 90 93 96 4 166 52010 Youth Valencia, Spain 58 kg 74 80 84 101 105 110 194 Representing Commonwealth Youth Games 2008 Pune, India 53 kg 159 British Championships 2009 Junior UK 2009 Youth UK
References
External links
BBC Olympics Profile