Jeong Bo Kyeong breeds on the success of Korean teammates

World bronze medallist Jeong Bo Kyeong of Korea gave her team a flying start at the Grand Prix of Dusseldorf as she won the first Grand Prix gold medal of her career. The first final of the competition featured Jeong against Paris Grand Slam gold medallist Galbadrakh Otgontsetseg of Kazakhstan and they were level at the end of regular time with two penalties apiece.

An additional two minutes were needed for Galbadrakh to be penalised for passivity to crown Jeong as the gold medallist.   

When Galbadrakh started representing Kazakhstan instead of her native Mongolia in August 2015 the general consensus was that the pint-sized fighter would be hard pressed to qualify for the Olympic Games. Now at the lofty heights of world number 16 the confident 24-year-old is a certainty for Rio 2016 and could even enter as one of the top seeds if such results continue. Jeong entered as the world number 14 and will improve on that ranking with this result as she closes in on the world’s top eight.

In the first semi-final Galbadrakh stayed the course with Havana Grand Prix bronze medallist Dayaris Mestre Alvarez (CUB) and prevailed on penalties. The Kazakh fighter became the first judoka to stop Mestre Alvarez from scoring and was only penalised once in the scoreless contest while her opponent was penalised twice. Once again Galbadrakh had the measure of her former teammate Munkhbat as she won the repeat of the Paris Grand Slam final in the first U48kg quarter-final in Dusseldorf. In the second semi-final Jeong defeated Tokyo Grand Slam bronze medallist Nataliya Kondratyeva (RUS) in just 11 seconds with a sode-tsurikomi-goshi for the maximum score.

The first medal contest of the Dusseldorf Grand Prix saw world number one Munkhbat Urantsetseg (MGL) defeated Kondratyeva. The opening contest of the final block was a tentative affair and the rivals could only be separated with 78 seconds remaining when the Russian was penalised with a shido for passivity. The second bronze medal was won by Mestre Alvarez. The world number 21 defeated Tbilisi Grand Prix bronze medallist Aurore Climence (FRA) who had surprised Olympic bronze medallist Charline Van Snick (BEL) in the preliminaries. The French fighter was penalised twice for passivity before Mestre Alvarez infringed with a false attack and then negative gripping with one second to go to equal the scoreboard and send the contest into added time. After 91 seconds of golden score Climence was penalised with a shido for passivity.