The 50-minute video, which was first shown to an audience of athletes, coaches, officials and journalists during a movie night at last year's IWF World Championships in the Kazakh city of Almaty, documents the progress of weightlifters at all levels.

It features in-depth and revealing interviews with 2005 world champion Dmitry Klokov and reigning men's under 77 kilograms Olympic champion Lü Xiaojun in their respective homes in Russia and China.

The documentary also includes 10-year-old weightlifters in Mexico and teenagers from Cameroon and Tunisia, and the IWF is hoping it can show a different side to weightlifting, outside of sporting competition.

"We wanted to show the many different backgrounds of our heroes - the weightlifters of the world," IWF communications and marketing manager Lilla Rozgonyi said.

"Capturing their emotions and roar of exultation, Lift the World presents weightlifting as a life path and gives an insight in how weightlifting can shape people's lives."

The short film highlights that weightlifting competitions do not only take place once every four years at an Olympic Games and the IWF hopes it will inspire more people to take up the sport.



"This could be a historical moment for us," IWF President Tamás Aján said.

"This film can encourage more and more young people to take up weightlifting.

"The IWF Executive Board fully supports such initiatives; showing to the world weightlifting as a basic sport for other disciplines."

The video may also go some way in changing the perception of weightlifting following a string of recent doping problems in the sport.

The most notable cases involved 2014 World Weightlifting Championships gold medallists Daniel Godelli of Albania and Kim Un-ju of North Korea, who were among eight athletes to produce "adverse analytical findings" for banned substances at the event.

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