LAKELAND — Lake Gibson sophomore weightlifter Zachary Griffin was absolutely shellshocked when he entered the RP Funding Center and noticed the crowd with all eyes on him.
But once Griffin (129 pounds) stepped on the platform, he remembered that it wasn’t about the fans in the stands. It was about zeroing in on his training for the 2026 Class 3A Florida High School Boys Weightlifting State Championships Thursday and executing a game plan. His poise worked, as he ended up placing fifth in the Olympic category with a total lift of 390 pounds.
This was his highest he had placed at state in three years. And he knows it wasn’t just about him.
“It feels great just knowing that I had a bunch of people specifically my coach who lift with me. … I have great people supporting me throughout my entire lift and my season. I had all their beliefs in me, so I brought it out here and poured my heart into my last lift, and now that’s it’s over, I got to get ready for next year,” Griffin said.
And to think that more than a year ago Griffin wouldn’t have even thought about the prospect of weightlifting being an option.
It all started when Lake Gibson boys head weightlifting coach Daniel Hargrove came up to then-freshman Griffin and presented the idea of lifting. At the time Griffin was entrenched in football as up to his freshman year, he played for the Lakeland Gators pop warner football team. The Lake Gibson student-athlete gave it a try and eventually loved the sport, so much so that he quit football to focus on it. Griffin said the decision was easy to quit football because he felt coaches were biased against him because he was a shorter player.
And so, it began. Pumping iron incrementally and consistently began to change his life.
“I feel like it’s changed my life … mentally because weightlifting is a thing where I don’t feel pressure,” Griffin said.
Griffin said arduously refining his weightlifting technique was the key to him choosing to separate himself from a group of then-friends who would engage in some fighting.
To Griffin, that was pressure and anxiety. But when he stepped on the platform, that erased that kind of fear.
“All my anxiety flew away because you can’t have anxiety when you are on the platform,” he said.
Helping Griffin in this process was Hargrove, who immediately noticed that Griffin was a weightlifter. But that doesn’t mean it was all peaches and cream from the start until now.
Even up to this year ahead of state, Hargrove noticed some obtuse habits Griffin did. But the longtime coach corrected him like he was one of his sons, speaking life into him while also pointing out the detrimental tendencies that can lead to a pitiful of fury. Once these logistics were adjusted, Griffin didn’t place lower than second in county, district and regionals, and Hargrove wasn’t surprised on Griffin’s output in state 2026.
“I’m very happy of his performance. He listened to me as a coach. He did the numbers I gave him. He stayed to our plan. And not once did he question my belief in him. … I told him, ‘I believe you can do this. Let’s just go show everybody how strong you are and how hard you worked…,” Hargrove said.
Griffin showed the Florida crowd who he was. Now with two years left at Lake Gibson, it’s all about reupping for 2027.
“I need to prepare myself. I need to work on my core. I plan on going up in a weight class. I need to make sure that I maintain that weight, Griffin said.
Polk County Class 3A state placers
The following Polk County lifters placed in Olympic: Winter Haven’s Peyton Bowers (119, third place, 355 total lift), George Jenkins’ Markham Morris (238, seventh, 515) and Haines City’s Elijah Rivera (unlimited, seventh, 545).
“It feels good. All the hard work in the past years (has paid off)…,” Bowers said.
For traditional, the following state placers in traditional were: Bowers (10th, 365), Ridge Community’s Javaree James (199, seventh, 605) and Ridge’s Lavonski Tubbs (238, third, 680).
This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Lake Gibson’s Griffin turns fear to results in state; Polk lift action
Reporting by Robert Magobet, Lakeland Ledger / The Ledger
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
