Lytvynenko met Marie Branser (GUI) in the final, a judoka at the other end of her career. She has never appeared in a World Judo Tour final before and was therefore guaranteed a career-best result before the ‘Hajime!’ was called.
As expected, Yelyzaveta Lytvynenko gave absolutely no chance to her opponent. She set up and executed a perfect sasae-tsuri-komi-ashi, landing in osaekomi, just in case, but the throw was given ippon, of course. Lytvynenko continues to rise and it is fantastic to see!
The first bronze medal contest was set to be delivered to either Maidelines Gorguet-Veranes (ROU) or Julie Hoelterhoff (GER). The formed gave clues about her tokui-waza, scoring with a seoi-otoshi early on and applying it several times more as the time went on. Hoelterhoff chased hard and put the Romanian under a lot of pressure. Two penalties were given but there was no time for a third and so Maidelines Gorguet-Veranes took the medal based on that first score. She had a good day and her reward was a first ever medal on the World Judo Tour.
The second bronze medal contest featured Lila Mazzarino (FRA) and Vicky Verschaere (BEL). It was again a seoi-otoshi which separated the athletes, in favour of Mazzarino. She threw for ippon just past the halfway point and was elated to win her first senior medal.
Final (-78 kg)
Bronze Medal Fights (-78 kg)
