Andreea Chitu-Felicitari :-)

2012/04/26 | 08:40 pm | in EJU

Chitu inspired by Romanian gold rush

The victory of Romanian Andreea Chitu was a big surprise. In the final U52kg she threw double European Champion Natalya Kuzyutina in a devastating Ippon and took the second gold medal for Romania at the first day of the European Championships in Chelyabinsk. The last time this happened was in 2004 at the Europeans in Bucharest when Dumitru and Ioana Aluas won the same categories as today.
Chitu won the European title U23 in 2010 in Sarajevo in the category U57kg but since she stepped back one category again she is extremely successful. Between 2006 and 2011 she fought U57kg but since a July last year Chitu is fighting U52kg. She won a bronze medal at the World Championships in August last year and won the World Cup in Korea last December. So far this year she wasn’t very successful competing in many events though: Sofia, Paris, Budapest, Duesseldorf and Warsaw only taking a poor seventh place in Poland. So her victory today was an outperformance of high level. In her home country Andreea Chitu should never be a problem for double European Champion Kuzyutina. But the small Chitu hit at the right moment with a devastating score finishing the match immediately.
It wasn’t a present though as Chitu defeated serious opponents such as Spanish Ana Carrascosa in her semi final and German Mareen Kraeh in the quarter final. In her first match she defeated Priscilla Gneto, an outsider for today’s title and Rosalba Forciniti (ITA) is runner-up of the 2010 Europeans, so not an easy road to the final. Her final opponent had to deal with the Romanian flow:
“I felt really inspired by Alina winning the gold. I saw the medal ceremony while I was waiting to get out, and I thought I really wished to be there, too. It is like a dream come true. Last year in Paris at the World Championships I fought in Bercy in Paris, so I already had experience with a lot of spectators. I didn’t feel the pressure of the crowd. I hope to qualify for the Olympic Games now.“

Maybe the contrary was the case for homeplayer Kuzyutina: “I really wanted to win here in Russia. Maybe I wanted it too much. I could have won the final match. At the end, I opened too much to attack and then my opponent used it to her advantage. This was the last competition before the Olympic Games, and each competition is an experience, no matter if you lost or won, but loosing is a sad experience.“
Kuzyutina already tasted that sad feeling at the Grand Prix of Düsseldorf this year finishing second. The only judoka who lost the final of the 2008 European Championships and won a medal in Beijing was Ruben Houkes who was doing the commentary today in the hall.

Two German women won a bronze medal. The German mentality helped Romy Tarangul today, pumping up the positive vibes before each match she was able to defeat Ana Carrascosa in her last match after she lost to Kuzyutina in the quarter final. “This was the revenge for last year when I lost in the bronze medal match to Carrascosa. It meant a lot to me to win this time. Being fifth is always so unsatisfiying and I have had quite a few fifth places. Anyway, it is always a goal to take a medal.“ Tarangul referred to last year’s Europeans in Istanbul and the World Championships in 2010 in Tokyo. She won a silver medal at the 2008 European Championships but finally won her last match.

Another tiny German women is Mareen Kräh who surprisingly defeated Ilse Heylen of Belgium who had beaten her four times before. But Kraeh lost her next match against Chitu but came back in the repechage defeating Joana Ramos and the unfortunate Spanish Laura Gomez who led the match despite a terrible headache due to a slam with her head on the ground after 10 seconds. It was a tough match and everything could happen. Gomez hold the arm of Kräh and made a throw blocking the arm of Kräh and was awarded with hansokumake ending the match for Gomez. The Spaniard couldn’t believe it and wasn’t aware of the danger and could only cry of disbelieve what just happened in a stormy match.

Kräh recovered from her forced elbow and said “It is always nice when there are two of us (Germans) on the podium. I fought Laura Gomez many times and she is a strong opponent. This bronze medal is a nice success for me as I made the podium again after six years.“ Kräh won bronze in 2006 in Tampere at the age of 22, now 28. Since the last five years she faces the competition of Tarangul and new German talents are knocking on the door.

http://www.eju.net/news/?mode=showNewsItem&id=1562

Rotterdam 2009

Fukumi wins gold, Hiraoka takes silver at worlds

Alina Dumitru,campioana Oimpica,lovita din greseala .Chiar daca nu a castigat primul loc ,ea va ramane pentru noi cea mai buna judoka a Romaniei si Campioana Olimpica!

http://www.judovision.org/?p=5579 Lupta Alinei cu Fukumi JPN

Stiri,sursa:

http://www.japantoday.com/category/sports/view/fukumi-wins-gold-hiraoka-takes-silver-at-worlds

Thursday 27th August, 05:41 AM JST

ROTTERDAM —

Tomoko Fukumi captured the women’s 48-kilogram gold medal on her debut at the world judo championships Wednesday. Fukumi, representing Japan in the weight class in the absence of seven-time world champion Ryoko Tani, now pregnant with her second child, scored an ‘‘ippon’’ victory over Olympic champion Alina Dumitru of Romania in the semifinals.

The 24-year-old executed a ‘‘kosotogari’’ leg trip against the Romanian 3 minutes, 12 seconds into the match. In the final, Fukumi earned a ‘‘wazaari’’ point for a ‘‘seoinage’’ shoulder throw and held on to beat Spain’s Oriana Blanco. In men’s action, Japan’s Hiroaki Hiraoka claimed the men’s 60-kg silver medal. Georgiy Zantaraya of Ukraine used kosotogari against Hiraoka for ippon 1 minute, 9 seconds into the final.

Meanwhile, two-time Olympic 66-kg gold medalist Masato Uchishiba suffered a third-round exit. Uzbekistan’s Mirali Sharipov upset the 31-year-old with a ‘‘sumigaeshi’’ corner reversal throw.
Tsagaanbaatar Khashbaatar of Mongolia won the category, defeating Spain’s Sugoi Uriarte in the final.

Judo, Olympic sport since 1964

Ryoko TAMURA Yawara-Chan

Ryoko Tamura was only sixteen years old when she upset Karen Briggs in the semifinals of the Judo extra-lightweight division at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. She lost to world champion Cécile Nowak of France in the final, but it was clear that the future belonged to Tamura. Indeed, she went undefeated for the next four years. Only 1.46m tall, Tamura was hugely popular in Japan, where her success had spawned an interest in women’s judo. She was known as “Yawara-chan” because of her resemblance to a popular comic book character. She entered the final of the 1996 Olympics with an 84-match winning streak. Her opponent was a complete unknown: 16-year-old Kye Sun-hi of North Korea, who had never heard of Tamura. Kye startled Tamura by attacking from the start and the double world champion was unable to establish her rhythm. With 22 seconds left, Kye scored with a leg hook and then added an insurance point when Tamura, on her knees, was penalized for “false attack.” Between the 1996 and 2000 Olympics, Tamura again won all of her matches. No Japanese athlete at the Sydney Games bore the weight of her nation’s expectations more than Tamura. “My goal at Sydney?” she said. “At best a gold, at worst a gold.” Tamura survived a near-upset in the semifinals when she was awarded a decision over North Korean Cha Hyon-hyang. As a contest, her final match against Lyubov Bruletova of Russia was an anticlimax, as Tamura used an uchimata (inner thigh throw) to score ippon after only 36 seconds. Tamura was mobbed by photographers and cameramen who broke down the barrier separating the athletes from the media. She was kept up doing live television interviews until 3am, when she was finally able to lock herself into her room at the Olympic Village. Alone at least, she burst into tears and then placed her gold medal on her pillow and fell asleep. At the Athens Olympic Games in 2004, Ryoko Tamura, whose name is now RyokoTani – her husband Yoshitomo Tani is a member of the Japanese baseball team – defended her title won in Sydney in 2000 and won the gold medal in the – 48kg, ahead of French woman Frédérique Jossinet. She thus became the first judoka to retain her Olympic title.

http://www.olympic.org/uk/athletes/profiles/bio_uk.asp?par_i_id=63208

Other names: TANI, Ryoko Born : 6 September 1975 Birthplace: Fukuoka (Japan) Nationality: Japan Sport : Judo

ATTENDANCE AT THE OLYMPIC GAMES Barcelona 1992 Atlanta 1996 Sydney 2000 Athens 2004

AWARDS Olympic medals: Gold: 2 Silver: 2 Details Other results: World Championships Gold: 6 (93, 95, 97, 99, 01, 03) Bronze: 1 (91)