IJF Masters in Qingdao last World Tour event of 2019

The IJF World Masters in Qingdao promises fireworks from the first contest to the last. In fact every category will deliver high class judo and some of the champions may have skipped the Grand Slam in Osaka but are present in Qingdao for the last IJF event of 2019 in this pre-Olympic year.

At U63kg France’s golden girl, Clarisse Agbegnenou looks unstoppable, while in the same division Great Britain have a judoka in each quarter. Russia have fielded 4 athletes at U66kg. These two countries have some tricky times ahead and some important national team rivalries to manage.

Canada and Japan will expect to sew up the two semi-finals of the U57kg category, with Olympic selection very much the finalists’ perceived reward.

Japan’s world bronze medalist Aaron Wolf will be seeking to upset seedings at U100kg as he finds himself in the same quarter as newly crowned world champion Fonseca of Portugal.

Of course we will also have the chance to see Saeid Mollaei back on the high performance tatami, but with a new flag on his chest. The former Iranian citizen and then refugee will compete for Mongolia. Mollaei, was world champion in 2018 and will be aiming at the 2020 Olympic rostrum for his new country in this very tough division U81kg where Sagi Muki and Matthias Casse are the first seeded players.

Xian Dongmei 

Double Olympic Champion and Chinese Judo Association President Xian Dongmei welcomed the athletes and coaches at the draw. In the years that she won the Olympic title, she also won the Paris Grand Slam. In Qingdao she won the Chinese title in the beginning of this century. The former Chinese Open was held since that time which later switched to Grand Prix level until 2016 when Hohhot took over as host city. Now Qingdao is back as organizer of the IJF World Masters which was held in Guangzhou in China last year.