Ortiz and Silva Morales secure double gold success for Cuba at Cancun Grand Prix

Victory for Ortiz in the +78kg women’s competition was backed by a gold medal for Ivan Felipe Silva Morales in the men’s -90kg category.

The 2018 Cancun Grand Prix was the first International Judo Federation’s (IJF) World Judo Tour event following last month’s World Championships in Baku, and featured a world-class line-up of over 300 judoka from 46 nations. The Tour made a swift return to the circuit especially with crucial Olympic qualification points at stake at the second edition of Mexico’s Grand Prix which once again attracted a host of Olympic and former world champions.

World silver medallist Ortiz defeated double world silver medallist Maria Suelen Altheman of Brazil for the 14th time in her career to win her fifth Grand Prix gold medal.

Having already beaten her Brazilian counterpart in the World Championships semi-final last month, the Cuban legend, who has won all three colours of Olympic medals available and is a leading contender for Tokyo 2020, recorded one more win against the Brazilian in golden score.

World silver medallist Silva Morales beat former Tashkent Grand Prix winner Marc Odenthal of Germany in the -90kg final. The Cuban was coming off the back of the best result of his career in Azerbaijan and was full of confidence as he took the bout in only 56 seconds.

Also on the final day, Two-time Grand Slam winner Rika Takayama of Japan defeated double Olympic bronze medallist Mayra Aguiar of Brazil in the women’s -78kg event to win her second Grand Prix title.

World number 18 Takayama took advantage of Aguiar’s continued dip in form this year to take the honours. With no gold medal since her 2017 world title victory, Aguiar, the defending Cancun Grand Prix winner, had to settle for silver as she was penalised with a third shido for a false attack after four minutes and 28 seconds of golden score.

In the men’s -100kg event, Russia’s Niiaz Bilalov won all four of his contests by ippon to win his first Grand Prix title. The Abu Dhabi Grand Slam winner defeated Ekaterinburg Grand Slam bronze medallist Laurin Boehler of Austria after 44 seconds of golden score to complete a perfect outing for his first Grand Prix gold medal.

Olympic champion Lukas Krpalek of the Czech Republic bounced back from his disappointing World Championships with gold in the +100kg event. Krpalek won his third Grand Prix gold medal as he responded to his fifth-place finish at the World Championships with a clinical showing, defeating former -90kg judoka and Antalya Grand Prix bronze medallist Andy Granda of Cuba in the last contest of the Grand Prix.

The previous day (Saturday) saw Belgium and Sweden win their first gold medals of the weekend’s action whilst Austria claim double women’s gold.

In the women’s -63kg event, Austria’s Magdalena Krssakova completed her Grand Prix hat-trick with victory over Canada’s Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard.

Krssakova’s compatriot, European Championships bronze medallist Michaela Polleres made it an Austrian double by taking gold in the -70kg category, defeating Warsaw European Open bronze medallist Gabriella Willems of Belgoium to win her first IJF World Judo Tour title.

World number seven Tommy Macias of Sweden beat former World Judo Masters gold medallist Denis Iartcev of Russia to win the -73kg title; the Swede using his clever footwork and lethal ashi-waza to win his second Grand Prix title in a thrilling display.

European Championships silver medallist Sami Chouchi of Belgium secured his first IJF World Judo Tour gold medal at the expense of former world bronze medallist Victor Penalber in the -81kg competition.

The Belgian looked in good form during the preliminaries with his trademark uchi-mata lighting up the competition and this gold medal and first IJF World Judo Tour win edges him closer to the world’s elite.