World Judo Tour day 2: farewell to a Georgian legend

The second day of the Grand Slam in Tbilisi provided yet another spectacle for judo fans around the world.

Inside the arena, the local Georgian crowd had come to see their heroes.

At -63kg the world number one Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard, once again made her way to a world tour final. There she faced Angelika Szymanska.

Beauchemin-Pinard dropped under her opponent to score a waza-ari and won gold.

IJF Sport Director, Michael Tamura was on hand to award the medals.

Home favourite, the 2012 olympic champion and 2021 world champion Lasha Shavdatuashvili was in action at -73kg.

He took on the relatively unknown Karen Galstian in the final and wasted no time in sealing the gold medal and the adoration of the crowd with an absolutely huge pick up technique, classic Georgian Judo.

He was awarded his medals by a proud Georgian Judo Federation President, Giorgi Atabegashvili.

“When I am competing in front of my people I have no right to lose. Only victory. No other result. Just focus on the victory. Credit to my supporters they always help me with additional motivation. I have to always fight until the end and make my people happy and I have to do everything for my country and of course I am very happy with today’s victory which I achieved in front of my people,” said Shavdatuashvili.

The -70kg category final was between the top two ranked players in the world Sanne Van Dijke and Barbara Matic. A moment of excellence from Matic stunned her dutch opponent, and earned her the victory.

She was awarded her medal by Chafik El Kattani, IJF Medical Commission Member.

“It’s really nice because they liked my throw, and the atmosphere is very good, they cheer all day. So I love it, I think it’s my lucky place," said Matic.

Timur Arbuzov took the -81KG