Junior Abram Davis won the 2023 state championship in the 242 weight division, lifting 690 pounds total in the state meet held at the Lake Hamilton football field on Saturday.
"It felt really good," Davis said.
"Last year, I got second place in the 220 weight class. It felt good coming back this year and winning the 242. I benched 375 and on power clean I got 315," he said.
"My parents were just really proud of me. They told me how proud they were of me, told me they loved me and they told me all the hard work paid off. At first, I had not really processed it yet. I was not sure how good my chances were going up a weight class, but it felt good to win."
Davis is a tight end and defensive end on the Cobras football team.
"My dad being a football coach I have always been able to come up here whenever I want to and get into the weight room," Davis said. "I come lift on average six days a week. I really work hard at it. Football is just motivation for me in the weight room. I want to play college football, if I get the opportunity."
For individual awards, the athletes are divided into weight classes versus school size classifications.
"I competed against Lake Hamilton and Benton," Davis said. "Taking them down felt good, all the hard work and hours I have put in the weight room finally paid off. My favorite lift to do is power clean."
Davis beat out Benton, second, and Benton-Harmony Grove, third, for the 242 state championship in the 4A classification.
"Abram won his weight class," Fountain Lake weightlifting coach Matt Klob said. "He lifted the most amount of weight for his weight class that day. I know he set a personal record on the bench press. It was the power clean that really set him apart from the second guy. He was just shy of lifting 700 pounds between two different lifts."
Klob is in his third season as the Lifting Cobras head coach.
"They do split them up as far as the team awards go," Klob said. "As far as the actual lifting goes, we would have in the 242 weight group. You would have a person from Fountain Lake, Greenland and Green County Tech. They all lift together. As far as the championship goes, they will do teams by the different classifications. They have a No. 1, 2 and No. 3 man as far as the weight class goes."
The Fountain Lake Lifting Cobras won state runner-up as a team lifting 4,200 pounds, Benton-Harmony Grove took home the 4A State Championship.
"Every person we have had in offseason has been working hard," Klob said.
"We lifted right about 4,200 pounds, which is still pretty strong. Harmony Grove edged us out by a couple of hundred pounds. They had some real strong kids," he said.
"The kids have been working hard all offseason. We took some of the offseason football players. There are only 10 divisions that you can lift in, but we took a few extra since it is a weight meet. You have to make weight to go into a different classification."
Sophomore Bricin Smith set a new personal record on power clean with 135 with 270 pounds lifted total.
"We had a few kids set personal records at the state meet," Klob said, "whether that was on bench or power clean. It was a good experience. We took a whole bunch of soon-to-be sophomores and they built up most of our team that we took. We had some young guys out there competing on an early Saturday morning."
Senior Sean Glenn benched 275 pounds, power cleaned 235 pounds and lifted 510 total pounds at state.
"He was a senior on the football team this past year," Klob said. "He kept lifting in the offseason with wanting to compete in the state meet."
The state meet was Fountain Lake's third meet of the season.
"This year we lifted at Lake Hamilton once before this," Klob said, "and then we went to Benton high school and lifted. This was our third weight meet of the offseason. We were going to host a fourth weight meet here."