Held in cooperation with the Weightlifting Federation of Slovakia, coaches from more than 20 European countries attended the two-day course in Košice.

The conference was opened by speeches from Antonio Urso, the EWF President, and Richard Rasi, the Mayor of Košice.

On day one, presentations were made on a series of topics including sports nutrition, weightlifting technique and training methods.

Day two saw the participants move to a gymnasium where practical sessions took place.

Anti-doping seminars were also held as part of the conference. 

They were led by the education manager of the Slovak Anti-Doping Agency, Lubomír Gulán, and the legal counsel of the IWF, Eva Nyirfa.

In December, Urso said weightlifting needed to make fundamental changes to its culture, its rules and the way competitions are presented.

It followed the results of the International Olympic Committee's retesting of doping samples from the Beijing 2008 and London 2012 Olympic Games, where dozens of weightlifters were caught following analysis with up-to-date technology.

"I was at one of the medal ceremonies and I could clearly hear the people behind me laughing and saying: 'those medals will be in different hands in a few years,'" the Italian said at the time.

"We are losing credibility as a sport.

"In 2008, 2009 and 2010, I wrote three editorials in the European Federation magazine and underlined that some of the results were not human results, that some women were becoming a man, that doping was beyond control. 

"Unfortunately some people attacked me, saying I was destroying weightlifting but today those people can see all too clearly what everybody else can see: doping is destroying us.

"If we lose our place in the Olympic Games, weightlifting will be nothing."