Junior World Champ Tonaki Funa earns first career Grand Slam

Junior world champion Tonaki Funa of Japan was the top seed in Tyumen in the U48kg category and the youngster was unbeatable on day one in Tyumen. Qingdao Grand Prix winner Tonaki, 20, was matched against world number 28 Nataliya Kondratyeva of Russia in the final.

London 2012 Olympian Kondratyeva, 30, put in the first attack as she failed with a right-sided yoko-tomo-nage but as Tonaki landed on top and nearly countered into osaekomi. An action-packed contest ensued for the full four minutes and into golden score after the regulation time finished scoreless and without a single shido been given to either fighter. Tonaki wore down her veteran opponent in golden score and with three minutes of added time under her belt the Japanese clinched her first Grand Slam gold medal by pinning down the home judoka with a kami-shiho-gatame for 20 seconds and ippon.

The first bronze medal fight pitted Budapest Grand Prix bronze medallist Milica Nikolic (SRB) against Olga Titova (RUS) as the home fighter was competing in an IJF medal contest for the first time in her career. With the scores tied at a yuko apiece, the Serbian fighter pressed forward and scored a waza-ari from an uchi-mata before impressively submitting her opponent with a well-executed piece of shime-waza. The second bronze medal fight opposed Podcetrtek European Cup winner Sabina Giliazova (RUS) who bested teammate and 22-year-old Orenburg European Cup winner Anastasia Pavlenko (RUS) by a waza-ari which was the only score of the contest. The result was the first at this level for Giliazova who was one of four Russian judoka in the category.