When the largest and most important tournaments come up in the IJF World Tour calendar, count on Japan to field most or all of its first team. And that means they will win the most classes and take the most medals.
That was the story of the Paris Grand Slam, with Japanese judoka winning two men’s classes and three in the women’s division. No other country had more than two. And Japan had finalists in four of the eight men’s classes and three of the eight women’s weights.
France (2-1-2) and Korea (2-0-3) each had five medals and popular French winners included reigning World Champion Clarisse Agbegnenou at -63 kg and Madeleine Malonga at -78 kg.
Of the multiple 2018 World Champions entered, only Naohisa Takato (JPN: 48 kg) and Agbegnenou managed to win in Paris. Summaries:
IJF World Tour/Paris Grand Slam
Paris (FRA) ~ 9-10 February 2019
(Full results here)
Men
-60 kg: 1. Naohisa Takato (JPN); 2. Yeldos Smetov (KAZ); 3. Temur Nozadze (GEO) and Amartuvshin Dashdavaa (MGL).
-66 kg: 1. Denis Vieru (MDA); 2. Vazha Margvelashvili (GEO); 3. Baruch Shmailov (ISR) and Georgil Zantaraia (UKR).
-73 kg: 1. Soichi Hashimoto (JPN); 2. Tsogtbaatar Tsend-Ochir (MGL); 3. Fabio Basile (ITA) and Lasha Shavdatuashvili (GEO).
-81 kg: 1. Dominic Ressel (GER); 2. Sagi Muki (ISR); 3. Saeid Mollaei (IRI) and Alan Khubetsov (RUS).
-90 kg: 1. Donghan Gwak (KOR); 2. Islam Bozbayev (KAZ); 3. Krisztian Toth (HUN) and Kenta Nagasawa (JPN).
-100 kg: 1. Varlam Liparteliani (GEO); 2. Aaron Wolf (JPN); 3. Guham Cho (KOR) and Petrr Paltchik (ISR).
+100 kg: 1. Sungmin Kim (KOR); 2. Hisayoshi Hirasawa (JPN); 3. Ushangi Kokauri (AZE) and Kokoro Kageura (JPN).
Women
-48 kg: 1. Ami Kondo (JPN); 2. Distria Krasniqi (KOS); 3. Melodie Vaugarny (FRA) and Otgonsetseg Galbadrakh (KAZ).
-52 kg: 1. Ai Shishime (JPN); 2. Natsumi Tsonoda (JPN); 3. Asteide Gneto (FRA) and Odette Giuffrida (ITA).
-57 kg: 1. Christia Deguchi (CAN); 2. Jessica Klimkait (CAN); 3. Momo Tamaoki (JPN) and Jisu Kim (KOR).
-63 kg: 1. Clarisse Agbegnenou (FRA); 2. Tina Trstenjak (SLO); 3. Andreja Leski (SLO) and Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard (CAN).
-70 kg: 1. Yoko Ono (JPN); 2. Margaux Pinot (FRA); 3. Saki Niizoe (JPN) and Barbara Timo (POR).
-78 kg: 1. Madeleine Malonga (FRA); 2. Luise Malzahn (GER); 3. Mami Umeki (JPN) and Chen Fei (CHN).
+78 kg: 1. Idalys Ortiz (CUB); 2. Iryna Kindzerska (AZE); 3. Minjeong Kim (KOR) and Akira Sone (JPN).
