A 15-year-old Bristol schoolboy has broken a European weight lifting record for his age group only six months after taking up the sport.

Now George Shelton, who is a Year 11 student at John Cabot Academy in Kingswood, has set his sights on becoming junior world champion.

The British champ will compete at the junior world weightlifting event in Belgium next week.

George qualified for the world championships by breaking the European record for the dead lift at the British championships.

He is training five days a week and will be lifting at the 75 kilogram weight and in the 82.5 kilogram category.

Year 11 students at John Cabot are backing his efforts with a no-uniform day, paying £1 each to go towards the costs of the trip.

George said: "I'm really excited about the prospect of competing at such a high level and to think I only took up the sport six months ago. If this goes well I'm planning to train for the Commonwealth Games and hopefully put myself forward for the Olympic squad for 2012."

PE teacher Chris Baker said: "When we took George to the British Championships we hoped it would be a good experience for him to get a flavour of real competition but when he broke the record we were all ecstatic.

"We're very proud of George and I'm sure all staff and pupils at John Cabot would like to wish him the very best of luck."