Biography
Shannon McNames is one of the top 48kg (106lb weight class) weightlifters in the country. She has been chosen to represent Team USA at the World University Games this coming summer. The University Games is a self-funded trip and is in Tapei City, Chinese Tapei, so we are working hard to raise money to get her there!
Her best competition lifts are a 71kg(156lbs) snatch and a 88kg(194lbs) clean and jerk. She is a 19 year old young lady who weighs only 106lbs, those are some big weights to throw over her head!
https://instagram.com/p/BN0dAzdjVbD
Previously Shannon had 3rd place finishes at Junior Nationals in 2016 and 2017, a 3rd place place finish at 2016 University Nationals and 1st at U25 Nationals. She was invited to traine at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs this past summer and served as an official alternate on both the 2017 Junior Pan Am Team and the 2016 University World Team. In 2016 and 2017 she received a monthly performance stipend from US Weightlifting based on her exceptional competition results. The current competition in her weight class is fierce and the weights Shannon is lifting would far exceed the Junior American Records from back in 2015-2016 but Megan Seegert and Pennsylvania Reading local Hayley Reichardt have pushed up the Youth and Junior American records more than 15kg over the past couple years.
Shannon is a West Chester University student and currently has a 3.896 GPA! She is pursuing a Nursing Degree alongside training full time with the dream of representing Team USA at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. She has been weightlifting for a little over one year, so her results so far are amazing considering her short tenure weightlifting! Prior to competing in weightlifting she did CrossFit for about 2 years and before that she was a competitive gymnast for 12 years, eventually training as a Level 10 gymnast.
