Sterckx, the best woman weightlifter Belgium has ever had, was rated the top female lifter across all weight categories at the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) Junior World Championships in Crete earlier this month.

She won the women’s 55 kilograms with a career-best total of 204kg, adding a world junior gold to the youth version she won in 2019, a year when she competed seven times.

"One of the jury members in Crete came and asked me, 'Nina, you can’t still be a junior, what are you doing here?’

"She had seen me competing at youth, junior and senior championships for so long she couldn’t believe it. It was so funny."

Sterckx first competed as a senior in 2018, when she was 15, and there will be very few, if any, teenagers who have taken part in as many international competitions as she has.

Those regular appearances, plus her sound technique and consistent improvement, have helped Sterckx to build an Instagram following of nearly 28,000.

"That is quite a lot for somebody from Belgium, especially in a sport that’s not so popular like football and athletics," Sterckx said.

She is hoping her popularity and achievements will help her to find commercial sponsors, which is not easy in a sport that gained little to no media coverage for decades.

Sterckx was fifth at 49kg in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, the best placing by a Belgian since Serge Reding won a bronze medal in 1968.

Her successes have at least earned her enough state funding to live off as she trains full-time, as she is ranked in the top three in Europe and the top eight globally.

Sterckx might never have taken up weightlifting had she not lived close to the triple Olympian Tom Goegebuer, who was the last Belgian to win a senior European title in 2009.

She had started in gymnastics aged five and, when she was 13, she was at a training camp at which a weightlifting coach happened to be on site.

"One evening he offered us a chance to try some weightlifting exercises and I did it with a friend," said Sterckx.

"He saw that I was pretty strong and also quite technical, and because he knew Tom he called him and mentioned it.

"Tom called my parents and asked them if I could train with him.

"I did and I loved it.

"I had just turned 13 and within a year I had changed to weightlifting after nine years in gymnastics."

Goegebuer, who has also coached Anna Van Bellinghen to European medals, said: "It’s quite a coincidence because there are nearly no weightlifting trainers in Belgium, and it just happened that Nina lived only 10 minutes away from me near Ghent.

"If Nina had lived two hours away the parents probably would have said no."

Because Sterckx was still at school and still doing gymnastics for her first year in weightlifting, time was short - so Goegebuer arranged for her to train at his home.

"She would ride over here on her bike and train in the garage," he said.

Sterckx is getting stronger, her technique has improved and she rated her victory in Crete - and her top individual rating - as one of her career highlights.

The Olympic Games was up there at the top but it had been hard work, because Sterckx went down to 49kg to make sure of her place and that meant losing more than 10 per cent of her body weight.

"It was tough, especially because of COVID, but I was always motivated because it’s the Olympic Games and I did a good job."

She also enjoyed plenty of big meals afterwards as she put that weight back on, and was able to eat plenty of ice cream, her favourite food.

Sterckx competes in the German Bundesliga for Speyer, and in her last match she came up against another Dutch speaker, the super-heavyweight Enzo Kuworge.

The successes of Sterckx for Belgium and Kuworge for the Netherlands, both of whom have won junior world titles, have helped weightlifting to grow in both countries, as is clear from the entries for Tirana.

The Netherlands has sent a team of 10, a remarkable achievement given it barely had a federation for decades, and Belgium has entered four, its highest number this century.

Britain has entered 16, Czech Republic 15, Slovakia, Moldova and Denmark 12, and Ireland five.

Among the athletes with the highest entry totals are Patricia Strenius from Sweden, Solfrid Koanda from Norway, Emily Campbell from Britain and Sterckx from Belgium.

While Turkey, Armenia, Bulgaria and Georgia are expected to finish at the top of the medals table, other nations are beginning to show evidence of improved development programmes.

The biggest name to look out for in the Championships, which run until June 5, is the multiple world record holder and champion Lasha Talakhadze.

The Georgian faces a double challenge from Armenia, as both Gor Minasyan and 23-year-old Varazdat Lalayan have posted 450kg entry totals.