World Ranking leader Chiruzu Arai can last for years U70kg

If you win Paris, Düsseldorf, the World title, the world team title and silver at the Grand Slam in Tokyo, one can say that Chizuru Arai had a great year. As World Ranking leader she tops the category U70kg followed by Portela, Alvear and a bunch of judoka of the new generation. Arai is one of them.

Chiruzu Arai was the automatic successor of Haruka Tachimoto who won the Olympic title in 2016 and who announced in 2017 to retire. Arai won it all. The 24-year old Japanese is working on her international successes since 2012 when we first saw her at senior level as winner of the World Cup in Jeju (KOR). As a junior she had won some international events in Europe and in 2013 she took a silver medal at the World Juniors in Ljubljana and won gold with the Japanese team. At the end of 2013 she won the Grand Slam of Tokyo, the first major stepping stone.

Each year Arai comes to Düsseldorf for the Grand Prix and after bronze in 2014 she won the event in 2017, took silver in 2016 and won again in 2017, after she had won in Paris. Meanwhile she won seven World Tour events. In Tokyo she lost to Yoko Ono who’s four years younger.

With her 24 years of age, she can at least proceed another  years, but as we know the competition is severe in Japan with news talents Saki Niizoe and Remi Aoyagi.

Watch the year overview stats for Chizuru Arai.