Olympic judo 2016 results: France takes home gold in men’s and women’s heavyweight finals

Friday featured the heavyweight finals in men’s and women’s judo, and France’s Teddy Riner and Émilie Andéol both brought home the gold in their respective matches.

Riner entered the men’s heavyweight competition favored to win gold. He was the top-seeded athlete in his weight class (over 100 kg), and he faced off against Japan’s Hisayoshi Harasawa, ranked No. 2 in the world. Riner was the reigning Olympic champion after winning gold in the London Games. The eight-time world champion defeated Harasawa 0s1 to 0s2.

Two bronze medals are awarded in judo because of the way the tournament is bracketed. In the first bronze medal match in the men’s heavyweight finals, Brazil’s Rafael Silva defeated Uzbekistan’s Abdullo Tangriev with a final score of 1s1 to 0s2. In the second bronze medal match, Alex Maxell Garcia Mendoza faced off against Or Sasson of Israel, and Sasson won. Sasson went up a weight class for the Rio Games, and was able to successfully defeat Mendoza with a score of 0s1 to 0s2.

The French added another gold on the women’s side in the over 78kg weight class as Émilie Andéol triumphed against Cuba’s Idalys Ortiz. Andéol was dominant, scoring 100s1 to Ortiz’s 0s1. Andeol got to the gold medal match after dethroning the reigning world champion, Yu Song of China, in the semifinals. After earning the silver, Ortiz has now won one gold, one silver and one bronze as an Olympian. She won gold in London in 2012, silver in Rio and bronze in Beijing in 2008.

Song, the top-seeded judoka in Rio, defeated South Korea’s Kim Min-jeong with a score of 100s1 to 0 for one of two bronze medals. The other bronze went to Kanae Yamabe of Japan, who beat Kayra Sayit of Turkey, scoring 10s3 to Sayit’s 0.