Hidayet Heydarov closes the year with another gold

Current world number 1 Hidayat Heydarov, fresh off the back of winning his 3rd senior European title in Montpellier a few weeks ago continued his gold rush in Tokyo and he showed great courage and maturity to defeat several tough opponents and captured the gold medal.

In the gold medal contest, it was Heydarov who came closest to scoring in regular time, attacking forward repeatedly using an over-the-back cross grip, but neither player could make an initial breakthrough. In the first exchange of golden score, Heydarov took the same grip but changed direction to throw Hashimoto with hikikomi-gaeshi for waza-ari. The Azeri was overjoyed to take his 6th grand slam gold medal and his first ever win over Hashimoto. He is arguably in the best form of his career and will hope that he can maintain it all the way to next year’s Olympic Games.

The first bronze medal match was contested between Lee and Terashvili. The Georgian came out of the blocks quickly, scoring waza-ari with uchi-mata-makikomi only 25 seconds in. Lee gave everything he could muster in search of his own score but Terashvili held on to earn his 2nd grand slam bronze medal. With his compatriot Lasha Shavdatuashvili exiting the competition early, this medal keeps the 20-year-old well in the running for his country’s spot at Paris 2024.

The second bronze medal match saw Lombardo take on Murodjon Yuldoshev (UZB). The Italian wasn’t taking any chances this time around and threw the Uzbek with his classic kata-guruma in just 50 seconds to take his 5th grand slam medal. After a couple of disappointing 1st-round exits following his silver medal at this year’s world championships, Lombardo will be delighted to finish 2023 on a high.

The toughest of Hidayet’s opponents came in his first contest of the day, where he was drawn to face 4-time grand slam winner Makhmadbekov (AIN). The neutral athlete went up by waza-ari 2 minutes in but an unfazed Heydarov responded in dramatic fashion, levelling the score using harai-makikomi before following up with a clever kata-guruma to snatch the victory from his opponent’s grasp. Another harai-makikomi saw him defeat Hristov (BUL) in round 3 after he had escaped a pin by the Bulgarian earlier in the bout.

Heydarov dispatched Eunkyul Lee (KOR) in the quarter-final, scoring first waza-ari and then ippon, to set up a semi-final showdown with Manuel Lombardo (ITA), against whom he had lost in all three of their previous encounters. The Azeri was clearly on a mission to improve that record and confidently threw the Italian for ippon with ko-uchi-makikomi before he could be countered. His place in the final alongside Hashimoto was confirmed; he is another fighter Heydarov had never beaten, with 7 attempts prior to today.

Last year’s Tokyo Grand Slam winner at U73kg, Soichi Hashimoto, has already secured his place at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, having been awarded his first selection for the event by his home country at the ripe old age, in judo terms, of 31. He returned to Tokyo for the 2023 edition of his home grand slam looking to pick up additional ranking points and improve his seeding for his maiden Olympic title challenge. He did so in his usual workmanlike fashion.

The 2017 world champion was typically slow to get going, needing penalties to get past Houssein (DJI) in his first contest. He also struggled to impose his will on his round 3 opponent Osmanov (MDA), going down two penalties to the Moldovan’s one in the first half of the contest.

Unfazed, the Japanese man kept coming forward and eventually threw his adversary with tai-otoshi; the resulting waza-ari score was enough to see him through.

Hashimoto’s quarter-final opponent came in the form of Ulaanbaatar Grand Slam 2023 silver medallist Lavrentev (AIN) and once more it took the awarding of 3 shidos to that opponent to send victory his way. The final hurdle in the preliminaries would be Giorgi Terashvili (GEO), who had reached his first grand slam semi-final in 18 months. The contest featured numerous strong attacks from both judoka, with only one penalty being awarded to either player. Hashimoto found his breakthrough in the second half of the match, using his trademark one-handed sode-tsurikomi-goshi to throw the Georgian for waza-ari and hold out for the win. A 9th grand slam final awaited him.