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maltatoday WEDNESDAY 28 FEBRUARY 2018 Sport 23 WEIGHTLIFTING Answers to the MaltaToday crossword will be published next Wednesday WEATHER: Partly cloudy becoming rather cloudy overnight VISIBILITY: Good WIND: North Northwest force 2 to 3 backing South force 4 and becoming South Southeast force 5 overnight SEA: Moderate SWELL Low Northwest becoming negligible A B C D E F G H 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 White to play and mate in four moves A B C D E F G H 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Last week's solution Sudoku rules are extremely easy: Fill all empty squares so that the numbers 1 to 9 appear once in each row, column and 9x9 box. PARTLY CLOUDY 16 º C /12 º C UV INDEX: 2 Today's Weather Chess Sudoku Pursuits Across 6. Ramble (6) 7. Letters (4) 8. Of moderate temperature (4) 9. Nothing (6) 10. Evade work (5) 12. Blackboard crayon (5) 15. Line on a weather map (6) 17. Cushions (4) 18. Tartan skirt (4) 19. Depression between hills (6) Down 1. Join (6) 2. Move rapidly (4) 3. Long flat piece of timber (5) 4. Surprise attack (6) 5. Aquatic vertebrate (4) 11. Automatons (6) 13. One who lives in rented rooms (6) 14. Courageous (5) 16. Stated (4) 17. Friends (4) Qc4 (Qb4 or Qa4) Kxe5 Rg5++ Zammit Stevens and Scicluna in the Italian Championships MALTA'S leading female athletes took on the Ital- ian National Championships this weekend in Rome. Both Yazmin Zammit Stevens and Elisia Scicluna are preparing for some major upcoming competitions, namely the Commonwealth Games and the Mediter- ranean Games among other tournaments and cham- pionships in between. The athletes were accompa- nied by national team coach and president of the MWA, Jesmond Caruana, who was also presenting medals as an honorary guest at the meet. Yazmin Zammit Stevens (69kg) was the first to take on the platform in what was one of the tough- est competitions. She finished with an 80kg snatch on her second attempt, missing out on 83kg on her third. She then continued to lift a 98kg clean and jerk on her last attempt, after closely missing her first two attempts. This result is only 2kg under her best ever performance back in November, were she has since been recovering very well from an injury. She showed she is on the right track in her final preparations for the Commonwealth Games in only six weeks' time. Elisia Scicluna (+75kg) also had a respectable per- formance on the day. She finished with a 75kg snatch and 94kg clean and jerk breaking one national record in the process. She also managed to finish in 3rd in her group with a total of 169kg matching her best ev- er performance done in Malta Championships only four weeks ago. This was the last international championships prior to the Commonwealth Games for Zammit Ste- vens, and both Zammit Stevens and Scicluna will be participating in another national competition in three weeks. Elisia Scicluna