Japan ran away with the medal table at the Tyumen Judo Grand Slam.
ADVERTISEMENTJapan ran away with the medal table at the Tyumen Judo Grand Slam. They arrived with a 15-strong team yet not one of them are part of their Rio 2016 team but rather Tokyo 2020 hopes.
Their seven-strong women’s team won all seven gold medals available while their male counterparts won two gold medals.
Russia, as hosts, were able to enter four judoka in each weight category as they entered a full team of 56 judoka and finished second with a medal haul of three gold medals, 10 silver and 15 bronze medals.
As Russia had lost all six head-to-heads with Japan in Saturday’s finals, Aslan Lappinagov was determined to buck the trend. He duly did so sending Japan’s Seidai Sato over for a yuko with a uchi-mata in the men’s -81kg category.
In the 100kg group, World Judo Masters bronze medallist Martin Pacek from Sweden made light work of Russia’s Adlan Bisultanov earning a Yuko from a neat ouchi-gari.
Junior World Championships bronze medallist Yusei Ogawa had to settle for silver on his Grand Slam debut as two-time Grand Slam bronze medallist Andrey Volkov from Russia won his first Grand Slam gold medal to send the crowd home happy.
Rika Takayama continued Japan’s winning run with -78kg gold defeating Slovakia’s Klara Apotekar with a tate-shiho-gatame for 14 seconds before securing victory with a juji-gatame
Nami Inamori maintained her country’s perfect record in Tyumen holding firm against Tunisia’s Nihel Cheik Rouhou.