VALDOSTA — Rick Tomberlin has added another weightlifting trophy to his collection.

Valdosta High’s weightlifting team repeated as Area 8 champions Saturday. The title was the second straight for Valdosta, and the 13th straight year one of Tomberlin’s squads has won it.

“We’re excited. It says a lot about our weight program and our kids,” Tomberlin said. “We have an excellent weight program, and it’s great to win the area like this.”

The Wildcats won the competition in a landslide. They earned 157 points, which was 110 points more than second-place Thomasville’s 47. Lowndes finished third with 46 points.

Valdosta will now prepare to defend the Class AAAAA state championship that it won last year. The state meet will be held March 22 at the state fairgrounds in Perry.

“We’d like to win the state all-classification title,” Tomberlin said. “We won the AAAAA state title last year, and we want to win it again. But I’d love to win the all-classification, like we did when I was at Washington County.”

Valdosta qualified 21 weightlifters for the state meet, a very large amount. To qualify for state, a lifter had to place in the top three in his weight class at the area meet. There are 10 different weight classes.

“That’s the most I’ve ever had qualify for state, by far,” Tomberlin said. “The most I’d ever had make it before was eight.”

Also, 49 Wildcat weightlifters placed in the top six in their weight class.

Valdosta High freshman Phillip Moore received the award for being the strongest pound-for-pound weightlifter at the competition.

Area 8 stretches from Seminole County, near the Alabama border, to Camden County, just a few miles west of the Atlantic Ocean, and as far north as Douglas. Cook and Lanier County were two other local schools who competed in the tournament.

Weightlifting has long been a big part of Tomberlin’s football program, first at Washington County and now at Valdosta. Most of the members of the weightlifting team are football players, and weight training is a big part of the Wildcats’ offseason conditioning program. Football players are required to take weightlifting class, which is taught by Tomberlin and assistant coaches Jeff Arnette, John Thompson and Michael Pollock.

“I’ve always put a lot of emphasis on it,” Tomberlin said. “I believe it’s important for any good athletic program, especially a good football program.”

Valdosta’s weightlifting program was recently featured in Bigger, Faster, Stronger magazine, a national publication that Tomberlin says is sent to every high school and middle school in the continental United States, and some schools overseas.

“That’s a great honor, to be featured in a magazine like that, which gets sent to schools around the country and around the world,” Tomberlin said.