Kazakhstan delivers another lightweight Cadet World Champion

The Almaty crowd was warmed up for another final of the day at these World Championships. The men’s U50kg promised a lot. A duel between Kazakhstan's Nurkanat Serikbayev and France's Romain Valadier Picard. And these two were authentic warriors, scoring and defeating one by one all their opponents.

Valadier Picard is leading the ranking list. Serikbayev is fifth. But in the final and in front of his crowd, the Kazakh judoka increased the level of his judo. He first scored waza-ari and completed his masterpiece with osaekomi to bring to his country its first gold medal in the competition.

Kazakhstan continues to be successful in the super lightweights at these kind of Championships. Also in Juniors and senior the lightweights are a strong asset of Kazakh judo. In 2013 and 2015 Kazakhstan celebrated a Cadet World Champion.

“My coach told me before the final to control his right hand and to do my judo”, said the new world champion to IJF Media Team after the final. “This is exactly what I did. I managed to execute ura nage first and I finished the job with osaekomi. To win at home in such a nice way is just amazing”, he concluded.

Ukraine's Mykyta Holoborodko won the first bronze medal contest against Chinese Taipei judoka Hsu Chun-Kai by ippon.

In the second bronze medal contest Georgia Nika Bachiashvili defeated Romania Alexandru Matei by ippon after a very physical match.