Sinclair Calculator

The Sinclair total is your weightlifting total (best snatch plus best clean and jerk) multiplied by a factor based on your body weight. The factor is called the Sinclair coefficient. It lets you compare lifters of different sizes on one scale, which is why it has long been used to pick the Best Lifter at a meet.

What the Sinclair Total Measures

The Sinclair total measures relative strength in the two Olympic lifts: how much you lift for your size. It does not measure absolute strength, technique or skill. Heavier lifters usually lift more, so a raw total favors bigger athletes, and the coefficient is meant to level that out¹.

The Formula

The coefficient comes from a curve fitted to world record totals across the body weight classes²:

If body weight is below b: Sinclair coefficient = 10^(A x X^2), where X = log10(body weight / b)

If body weight is b or more: Sinclair coefficient = 1

Sinclair total = total (kg) x Sinclair coefficient

Men: A = 0.700767819, b = 201.159 kg

Women: A = 0.674107991, b = 163.918 kg

These are the constants for the 2025 to 2028 cycle, published by the Alberta Weightlifting Association⁷ ⁸, which also issued the 2021 to 2024 set posted on the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) website². The method was developed by Canadian official Roy Sinclair, adopted by the IWF in 1979 and published in 1985³ ¹.

How This Calculator Computes Your Result

Choose your sex and units (kg or lb). Then enter your body weight and either your snatch and clean and jerk or a total you already know. Pounds are converted to kilograms (1 lb = 0.45359237 kg), because the formula works in kilograms. The tool shows your total, your Sinclair coefficient to 4 decimals, and your Sinclair total to 2 decimals in kg, with a pound version for reference.

If your body weight is at or above b, your coefficient is 1. Your Sinclair total then equals your total. The constants are updated after each Olympic cycle. This tool uses the 2025 to 2028 set⁷ ⁸. The IWF also changed its body weight classes on 1 June 2025⁶.

What Your Result Means

A higher Sinclair total is better. Roughly, it scales your total up to what it would be worth at the reference weight b, which stands in for the heaviest class in the fit². That is why lighter lifters get a bigger coefficient. Compare it only with lifters of the same sex, and only with scores made using the same set of constants.

Here is how the coefficient changes with body weight (2025 to 2028 constants, our calculation):

For example, a 73 kg man with a 140 kg snatch and 170 kg clean and jerk has a 310 kg total. His coefficient is 1.3671, so his Sinclair total is 423.80. A 59 kg woman with an 85 kg snatch and 105 kg clean and jerk has a 190 kg total and a Sinclair total of 257.93.

We do not label scores as beginner, intermediate or elite. We found no published data behind the levels used on other sites.

Where Sinclair Is Used

Sinclair has been the standard way to name a Best Lifter across weight classes in many meets, and the formula is recalculated every four years³. The IWF recognized it as its official comparison until late 2018, when it adopted Robi points, but it stayed in use at many regional events⁴. USA Weightlifting switched its national Best Lifter awards from Sinclair to a newer system called Q-points on 1 January 2025⁵. The same change replaced the Sinclair-Meltzer-Faber (SMF) masters age factor, which is why this calculator does not apply an age adjustment⁵.

Limitations of the Sinclair Formula

Sinclair is a fit to world records, so it depends on which records stood when the constants were set. A 2023 study of about 1,900 elite lifters found that Sinclair points overvalue performances in the lighter classes for both men and women and undervalue heavier women⁴. The 2017 version also tended to favor heavier men, and the 2021 to 2024 update reduced that for men⁴. Sinclair totals also varied more across classes among medalists than the newer Q-points did⁴.

Because the constants change each cycle, the same lift gives a slightly different score in a different cycle. For the 73 kg man above, the 2021 to 2024 constants give a coefficient of 1.3480 instead of 1.3671 (our calculation from the published tables)² ⁷. Men's and women's scores use different constants, so a man's Sinclair total cannot be compared with a woman's.