Skilful South Korean Kim Minjong is peerless in Santiago

Korean talent Kim Minjong brought the 20-contest winning streak of Russian David Babayan to an abrupt end in Chile. Kim won the cadet world title and doubled the Korean gold as Kim Ju-Hee won gold U57kg on Friday. The Koreans had a gold drought since 2009 at Cadet World Championships.

Kim, Junior Asian Championships winner, who is undefeated in high school competitions at home over the last two years, is a dynamic heavyweight while Babayan also has a degree of athleticism which gave the heavyweight final all the ingredients to produce an explosive contest. Kim attacked with a modified kata-guruma and moments later his yoko-tomoe-nage as his Russian opponent was on the back foot. With six seconds left on the clock Babayan initiated an illegal bear hug from which Kim was still able to throw with an uchi-mata for a waza-ari. However, the score was cancelled and instead a third shido was correctly given to the Russian which resulted in hansoku-make for a third indiscretion.

In the first semi-final Babayan held down 16-year-old one-time Cadet European Cup winner Leonardo Sant’Ana (BRA) for 20 seconds and ippon to move into the final. In the second semi-final Worlds debutant Jonas Schreiber of Germany was thrown by Kim via a seoi-nage for ippon.

The first bronze medal was won by Schreiber who overpowered Cadet African Championships winner Zouhair Esseryry (MAR) on the ground with osaekomi-waza in the form of a mune-gatame hold for 20 seconds and ippon.

The second bronze medal was captured by Omer Aydin (TUR) with a true heavyweight ippon from a seoi-otoshi as he launched Sant’Ana for ippon with 13 seconds left on the clock. 

Coloured belts and pipedreams are par for the course, as the stars of tomorrow get to grips with the invasion of their anonymity, as the winning judoka are earmarked as starlets and ones to watch on the journey towards the freshly awarded Paris 2024 and Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games. 

In the picture IJF A referee and 1996 Atlanta Olympic champion Cho Min-Sun joins her long-time teammate and IJF Hall of Famer Ki-Young  Jeon for a photo with South Korea's +90kg winner Kim Minjong