The new IJF World and Olympic rankings (including the World Championship results from Abu Dhabi) are eagerly awaited. There will then be an overview of the exact status of the quota places for all nations. Of course, the qualification period for Paris runs until 24 June, until then there are still two competitions in Europe (Madrid European Open/ESP, Podcetrtek European Cup/SLO).
The facts and figures from the past World Championships in Abu Dhabi (UAE, 19 – 24 May) were published on Friday. An overview:
- 658 participants (309 women/349 men) from 107 nations competed at the 72nd Judo World Championships. By far the most of the judoka came from Europe (338 athletes from 39 nations), followed by Asia (161/22), Pan-America (95/21), Africa (59/23) ands Oceania (5/2).
- The best-populated weight classes were -63 (with 49 starters), -48 (48) and -70 (47) for the women and -81 (60), -66 (58) and -73 (52) for the men.
- Only Tato Grigalashvili (GEO/-81) was able to successfully defend his title from Doha.
- Although there was only one Olympic starter, judo superpower Japan was also the clear number one in the medal table in Abu Dhabi with 3 x gold, 2 x silver and 4 x bronze (in comparison: in Doha 2023 there won 2 more gold medals (5-2-4)).
- The best European nation was Georgia in second place with 2-1-1 (exactly the same record as in 2023). Azerbaijan (2-0-0), Italy (1-2-0), France (1-1-3), Germany (1-0-1) and the Netherlands (1-0-0) were five other European nations in the top 10. In total Europe won 23 medals, 8 in gold.
- A total of 697 fights (330 women, 367 men) were held over the five days of competition. 557 fights (79.9 per cent) were decided by one score. No fewer than 126 fights (18.1 per cent) went to a golden score. The longest fight lasted a total of 12:19 minutes. Average fight length in the golden score: 01:39 min. 26 fights were decided by direct disqualification (Hansoku-make), 129 fights after 3 shidos for one of the two opponents.
- The 73rd edition of the World Championships will take place in Europe again next year, in Budapest (HUN) to be precise. It will be the 3rd World Judo Championships Seniors in the Hungarian capital after 2017 and 2021.
Author: EJU Media