The French national anthem ‘La Marseillaise’ rang out as Teddy Riner held his nerve to take gold at the Qingdao judo Grand Prix in China. The
ADVERTISEMENTThe French national anthem ‘La Marseillaise’ rang out as Teddy Riner held his nerve to take gold at the Qingdao judo Grand Prix in China.
The eight-time world champion looked in great shape and proved unstoppable in the men’s heavyweight category as his opponent Sung-Min Kim accumulated four shido penalties for passivity in the showpiece match.
Japan’s Kenta Nagasawa produced a superb performance to stun 2013 champion Asley Gonzales in the under 90 kilo final.
The young sensation had to dig deep and took advantage of a defensive error from the Cuban in the dying seconds of the bout to throw him for waza-ari with a tai-otoshi technique.
In the under 100 kilo class, Tuvshinbayar Naidan, who won Mongolia’s first ever Olympic judo gold medal at the Beijing Games in 2008, outclassed Maxim Rakov of Kazakhstan to secure the title as the scoreless contest was settled by shido penalties.
In the women’s event, Shori Hamada of Japan beat the former world and current Olympic champion Kayla Harrison in the under 78 kilo quarter finals and carried her momentum into the showpiece match, downing Audrey Tcheumeo thanks to a perfectly executed shime-waza.
In the over 78 kilo category, local hope Song Yu gave the Chinese fans something to cheer about with a hard fought win over compatriot Sisi Ma, who lost as a result of an early shido.
The bronze medals were won by Minjeong Kim and Ukraine’s Svitlana Iaromka.