Manatee’s Joshua Booker is the All-Area Boys Weightlifter of the Year

Joshua Booker competed in four sports for Manatee High School this year with varying levels of excellence, but there was one constant: success.

Booker is a talented running back, a medal hopeful as a wrestler and a promising performer in track and field as a shot putter. So far, though, his greatest accomplishments have come as a weightlifter. For the first time, the junior earned the Herald’s highest honor as the All-Area Boys Weightlifter of the Year.

To his credit: Booker joined Manatee late in the season after reaching the Class 4A wrestling championship meet, and his rapid improvement in the clean and jerk turned him into Manatee County’s top finisher at the Class 2A championships with a fourth-place medal in the 219-pound weight class.

The junior already excelled in the bench press thanks to his background as a football player — he has several offers, including one from South Florida — and put up 360 pounds in the final.

By the end of the year, he managed a clean and jerk of 290 pounds to post a 650-pound total at the 2A championship. He missed out on a bronze because of a body-weight tiebreaker. All three lifters who finished ahead of Booker at 219 pounds were seniors.

HONORABLE MENTION

Manatee: Jernard Porter, senior, 154; Seth Walter, senior, 238. Lakewood Ranch: Noah Ben-Ghuzzi, junior, 183; Chase Sharp, senior, 219; Devonte Grooms, senior, heavyweight. Palmetto: David Centeno, senior, 129; Ricky Ochoa, senior, 139; Nahum Guerrero, junior, 169; Andrew Duncan, junior, 199; Corey Brady, senior, heavyweight. Bayshore: Uriel Sanchez, sophomore, 119.

This story was originally published June 1, 2017 at 6:06 PM with the headline "Manatee’s Joshua Booker is the All-Area Boys Weightlifter of the Year."