Korean Kim Jan-Di competes and overcomes the best

Korean Kim Jan-Di is seriously making herself a candidate for an Olympic medal. At the Grand Slam of Paris, the Korean again took a gold medal. She’s won in Tashkent, Abu Dhabi, Jeju and now the big one in Paris.

World number one and winner of the last World Masters, Dorjsuren Sumiya of Mongolia qualified for the final against the Korean Kim Jan-Di, winner of the last Abu Dhabi Grand Slam. Being the world number one does not guarantee the top spot on the podium and especially not in Paris and this was verified as Kim was never really in danger against the Mongolian, except during a ground work session, where she was close to tapping from shime-waza. But beside that dangerous moment for her, Kim totally controlled the final and scored a first waza-ari, before concluding with a heavy counterattack for ippon.

In the first semi-final top seed Dorjsuren defeated Brazil’s first female world champion Rafaela Silva (BRA) with eight seconds left. The Brazilian was losing 2:1 on shidos when her Mongolian opponent was able to overpower her in ne-waza with less resistance than expected and trapped her in osaekomi for 20 seconds and ippon. In the second semi-final Havana Grand Prix winner Marti Malloy (USA) was beaten by in-form Kim by a yuko score to progress into the final.

The first bronze medal was won by high-flying Malloy in the battle of -57kg London 2012 Olympic bronze medallists as she left French Olympic bronze medallist Automne Pavia  disappointed at home. Malloy was good value for the victory which came by way of a yuko from an ippon seoi-nage which was the only score of the contest. Both judoka are well placed to be chasing their second Olympic medal this summer in Rio de Janeiro. The second bronze medal was won by 2013 world champion Rafaela SILVA of Brazil against Tunisia Open bronze medallist Arleta Podolak of Poland. Only ranked 43 on the world ranking list, Podolak was in good form today in Paris and after 30 seconds of their bronze medal contest, both athletes were penalised with a shido for blocking. Podolak even took the lead for a short while when Silva was penalised a second time. But then the former world champion scored a yuko with an opportunist counterattack, which was enough to secure the medal.