Hikari Yoshioka gears up to senior gold level

Hikari Yoshioka captured the gold medal at the Grand Slam in Ulaanbaatar on Friday. Yoshioka, an athlete coming straight from the juniors, haloed with the world crown in that age category in 2022. This time she steps on to the highest podium at the Grand Slam.

The final was won by Yoshioka in pure Japanese style, on the ground, after she freed her leg a first time and got the osae-komi-waza, but then Sabina Giliazova caught the leg again. Yoshioka took her time to free her leg again and conclude the contest for a first win in a grand slam.

So Narantsetseg Ganbaatar (MGL) and Julia Figueroa (ESP) still remained to save the honour of the main seeds of the category but the Spaniard quickly returned to the locker room after a defeat in the first round, while Ganbaatar suffered the same fate against Sabina Giliazova (AIN), who qualified for the final and joined Yoshioka on the podium afterall.

Catarina Costa (POR) and Galiya Tynbayeva (KAZ) faced each other during the first contest for a bronze medal. Costa was immediately to action with a rapid yoko-tomoe-nage for a first waza-ari after a few seconds and was close to scoring a second time a little later. As half of the contest was already covered, Costa launched a kata-guruma to conclude a well managed competition day and it was a bronze for Portugal.

Israel had a place guaranteed on the podium as Tamar Malca (ISR) and Shira Rishony (ISR) met in the second bronze medal contest. The match remained undecided for a long time. It was during the golden score period that eventually, Tamar Malca scored ippon with a beautiful low sode-tsuri-komi-goshi.