In cafes along the main road dissecting the small town, 10 kilometres (six miles) from the border with Iran, chatter rarely veers far from the successes of local lifters. A weightlifting training centre, set up in 1993 in a Badra high school, is still in operation.
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Badra
In eastern Iraq, a small town builds weightlifting champions
A 1993 weightlifting training centre is keeping the competitive sport alive some 200 km east of Baghdad