Yuliia Kurchenko claims gold at Grand Slam Tbilisi

Two strong young Ukraine women dominated the division U78kg in Georgia at the Grand Slam. Yuliia Kurchenko reached the final, and Lytvynenko reached the semis as well but had to fight for bronze. The final, between Kurchenko and Dutch woman Guusje Steenhuis was bound to be a contest of power. Steenhuis was immediately to action with her makikomi but the Ukrainian was well prepared.

After several attempts from the Dutchwoman, Kurchenko countered one such attack and it earned her an ippon, a gold medal and a much needed 1000 world ranking points.

In the semi-final she had the fully in form Dutchwoman Guusje Steenhuis but that was a step too far and Steenhuis took the win and the place in the final, forcing Lytvynenko into a bronze medal contests she had not envisaged being in.

The first bronze medal contest therefore pitted Ma and Lytvynenko against each other. It was very even and took until deep into golden score for Lytvynenko to finally make her sasae-tsuri-komi-ashi work, scoring a waza-ari to grab a place on the podium.

The second bronze medal would go to either Tcheumeo or Boehm. Both arrived needing the win to strengthen their cause within their respective federations, with huge domestic competition weighing on their minds. Only one could take the medal though and eventually it was Alina Boehm who threw in golden score to reach the podium.

The number one seed Anna-Maria Wagner was actually unable to compete due to illness and her compatriot, Alina Boehm took full advantage during the preliminaries, making her way to the semi-final stages without looking back. She dealt with China’s 2022 world silver medallist Zhenzhao Ma to get there. There though, she came a cropper, losing to the chasing Ukrainian, Yuliia Kurchenko, eager to pass her teammate, Lytvynenko.