S. A. Wijewickrema was an outstanding weightlifting coach

He was promoted to Director of Sports in the 1980s and he was instrumental in promoting weightlifting and powerlifting for 31 years and he was the Vice-President of the National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka for eight years.

Wijewickrema won the Mr. Kandy contest organised by the Ceylon Physical Cultural Association and then he was able to win the Mr. Central Province, Junior Mr. Ceylon and won the third place at the Senior Mr. Ceylon contest.

He was also a talented muscle dancer for 20 years since 1960. He represented

Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) at the G. A. N. E. F. O. Games held in China in 1982 and the team members who participated at this contest were Stanley Perera, M. Sabaratnam, M. N. Majeed and Dr. D. Cruze.

In the meantime, he obtained permission from the Ceylon Weightlifting Association to start training in addition to bodybuilding outside Colombo from 1955 to 1992.

And at his request, coaches such as Angle Spassov and D. Slavov of Bulgaria, Emer Suga from Hungary and Alexander Aleceanco from Russia arrived in Sri Lanka to train the bodybuilders and the weightlifters.

Thereafter, Wijewickrema trained the participants with more confidence and he was able to produce talented weightlifters. In time to come, he produced more than 30 International medal winners.

Some of them were: S. M. de Silva (Bronze Medallist, SAF Games), Asela Wijewickrema (Gold Medallist, Silver Dragon Meet and Silver Medallist, SAF Games), B. B. Wickremasinghe, Gamini Gunathillake, Athula Wijewickrema, Gamini Weeraratne and Gamini Kumarasinghe.

Among the winners in powerlifting were Ransilu Jayathillake and Athula Wijewickrema, both of whom won Gold Medals at different meets with new records. In addition, S. K. S. Pradeep won a Silver Medal.

After his retirement, he joined the YMCA in 2000 and since then he has trained many weightlifters and powerlifters.