Samoa weightlifter Nevo Ioane raked in three gold medals for Samoa at the XVII Pacific Games to place the country ninth overall on the medal tally.

Ioane took gold for the 120-kilogram snatch, 165-kilogram clean and jerk and gold for the total overall winner of his division and he also set a new Oceania record making his coach and team proud.

Olivia Borg, 22, made her Pacific Games debut and won Samoa’s first gold in the women’s 100-metre butterfly. In an interview with ABC Pacific News, she said that all her training and hard work paid off and is super proud of representing her country.

“Honestly it’s something to remember forever as my first Pacific Games and I’m definitely going to remember this and having my culture behind me makes it even more worth it,” she told ABC.

“It’s really good to see all the different sports around you representing the same country, meeting new people. Thank you so much for all your support and I really appreciate it and it's good to come home with the gold medal.” 

Team Samoa also won silver in the men's swimming 4x100 meters freestyle relay with Thomas Frost, Johann Strickland, Hector Langkilde and the youngest on the team Solomona Hamilton.

Milo Toleafoa also won Samoa’s first medal, a bronze in the Para Table Tennis sport paving the way for the rest of Team Samoa to bring in more medals.

Derek Sua came out with a bronze for Judo in the 100-plus kilogram division, bringing Samoa’s total medal count to seven comprising four gold, one silver and two bronze medals.