Genny Pagliaro of Italy was defending the snatch, clean and jerk and total titles which she won at the 2014 Championships in Tel Aviv, Israel, but it was the Turkish duo of Nurcan Taylan and Sibel Ozkan Konak who took centre stage.

Taylan, gold medallist at the 2004 Athens Olympics, took the snatch title with a lift of 81kg, while Pagliaro although lifting the same weight took silver due to her heavier body weight and Konak took bronze.

Konak then took command of the division by achieving a clean and jerk of 99kg to take her first gold ahead of France’s Anais Michel and Romania’s Monica Suneta Csengeri.

Her clean and jerk effort combined with her snatch lift of 80kg proved enough for Konak to win the overall competition with a total weight lifted of 179kg, while her teammate Taylan took silver with 178kg and Pagliaro bronze after achieving a total of 176kg from the disciplines.

The Sports Palace, located in the centre of Tbilisi, was also treated to the men’s under 56kg competition, which saw Spain’s Josue Brachi win the snatch title after lifting 118kg.

The Spaniard lifted the same as the Italian Mirco Scarantino, but won gold due to his lower body weight, while Turkey’s Ismet Algul finished third with 114kg.

However Moldova’s Oleg Sirghi then became the star of the contest, producing a 151kg lift to take the snatch gold, with his lift 5kg more than his nearest challenge Smbat Margaryan of Armenia.

Sirghi's clean and jerk performance enabled him to also take the overall title, with Margaryan and Italy’s Scarantino earned silver and bronze medals in both disciplines.

The second day of competition in the Georgian capital will see medals decided in the men’s under 62 and 69kg events, in addition to the women’s under 53kg competition.