Australia’s Liam Larkins has notched up a personal best as he finished eighth in the men’s 77kg weightlifting at what was a lively Toa Payoh Sports Hall.

Larkins couldn’t hide his excitement as he punched the air following his Clean and Jerk, cementing a 2kg combined personal best as he lifted a total of 212kg.

Russia’s Artem Okulov blitzed the competition recording a total of 327kg to take gold, with Thailand’s Chatuphum Chinnawong claiming silver with 311kg and Kazakhstan’s Rustem Sybay taking home bronze with a 285kg total.

Okulov held a 4kg advantage over Chinnawong following the Snatch and asserted his dominance lifting 182kg on his third attempt to dominate proceedings and take the win by 16kg.

While Larkins knew he may not have been in contention for the gold he was extremely pleased to not only claim a combined total personal best, but also smash his Clean and Jerk competition personal best by four kilograms.

“I have been wanted to get 120kg for ages and a lot of the boys told me I couldn’t do it. So it was good to get that out of the way I wanted to do that so bad.”

Larkins did admit that he was nervous at times as he competed what was by far the biggest competition of his career.

“I was feeling really good but I missed the first two of each (discipline) and I think the nerves got to me a bit.”

“I do want to more of this and hopefully nest time do better again. The crowd was awesome.”

However with his family in the stands Larkins knew he could pull out something special.

“My dad, two sisters and grandma are here which is great.”

“When you hear them cheer it is really great, I couldn’t ask for anything better.”