{"id":5226,"date":"2019-05-19T15:36:23","date_gmt":"2019-05-19T15:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.judoalberta.com\/?p=5226"},"modified":"2019-05-19T15:37:39","modified_gmt":"2019-05-19T15:37:39","slug":"first-medal-for-kelly-deguchi-on-canadian-soil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/first-medal-for-kelly-deguchi-on-canadian-soil\/","title":{"rendered":"FIRST MEDAL FOR KELLY DEGUCHI ON CANADIAN SOIL"},"content":{"rendered":"

Edmonton, May\u00a018, 2019 \u2013 The U16 and U21\u00a0athletes were in action on the mats of the Butterdome at the University of Alberta, in Edmonton, for the Canadian Open Judo Championships.<\/p>\n

For\u00a0Kelly\u00a0Deguchi<\/strong>, it was a first competition experience in Canada. At 20\u00a0years old, Christa\u00a0Deguchi\u2019s younger sister decided to follow her footsteps and recently chose the Lethbridge Judo Club, in Alberta, as her new team. After seeing the support and success Christa has gotten from Judo Canada, Kelly was inspired to try it out for herself. Her first experience was a success, winning the gold medal in the U21 -57\u00a0kg category. \u201cI was very nervous this morning, but I did my best, and I\u2019m very happy. The Canadian girls are very quick and powerful, it was not an easy victory,\u201d said the judoka who will fight again tomorrow in the senior category. \u201cI\u2019m happy with my decision to come here, and I\u2019m hoping I can represent Canada in international tournaments with my sister in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Greta\u00a0Goasdoue-Wallace<\/strong>\u00a0(-63\u00a0kg), from Hiro\u2019s Judo Club, in Calgary, stood on the highest step of the podium for the second day in a row. The 14-year old won a surprise gold medal on Friday in U18, and a second one in U16 today. Her first fight was won by ippon after a few seconds, setting the trend for the day. \u201cI felt ready today, because I knew the girls I was up against. With the medal I won yesterday, I knew today would be a good day. Last year I fought in U16 and I won the silver medal, so it was great to come back and do even better this year!\u201d<\/p>\n

On the men\u2019s side, in U16,\u00a0Norbert\u00a0Andras<\/strong>, 14, was undefeated in the -55\u00a0kg category for the second year in a row. \u201cI was a little nervous this morning, but after the first fight, I thought \u2018I got this,\u2019 and I knew I\u2019d be able to win a medal.\u201d He will be fighting again next month at the Canada Cup, trying to defend another title he won last year.<\/p>\n

Last but not least,\u00a0Joel\u00a0Demaere\u00a0<\/strong>(-60\u00a0kg), from Lethbridge Judo Club in Alberta, was trying to win a first title in U21, having won a gold medal in U16 two years ago. \u201cI had a really good weight cut before the tournament, so I felt strong and confident coming in. I felt really good, I was able to keep my nerves under control, so it really was a perfect day.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Andras, Demaere, Goasdoue-Wallace and Deguchi<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Manitoba\u2019s Small but Mighty Team<\/strong><\/p>\n

The province of Manitoba decided to play it safe for this edition of the Canadian Open Judo Championships, only bringing the very best athletes to bring medals home.\u00a0Airton\u00a0Nakamura<\/strong>, one of Manitoba\u2019s provincial coaches, was satisfied with his team\u2019s performance. With only 10\u00a0athletes fighting today, they were able to win 1\u00a0gold and 3\u00a0silver medals.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo far, so good! Our athletes are consistent, so the ones who were expected to medal did. The younger ones might need a little more experience, but that\u2019s what they\u2019re here for, and they\u2019ll come back ready to win it next year,\u201d he said. \u201cWe might try to involve them in more tournaments before Nationals next year, to make sure they have the experience and maturity to perform at a high level. We were able to maintain our performance level from last year, which was a good year for us. Most of our athletes fighting in senior tomorrow are actually U21, but we expect the same level of effort from them, and we have high hopes. They are a strong team, and they have the potential to win more medals.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Medals after day\u00a02<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
<\/td>\nGold<\/strong><\/td>\nSilver<\/strong><\/td>\nBronze<\/strong><\/td>\nTotal<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Alberta<\/strong><\/td>\n15<\/td>\n7<\/td>\n14<\/td>\n36<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Quebec<\/strong><\/td>\n13<\/td>\n17<\/td>\n28<\/td>\n58<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
British Columbia<\/strong><\/td>\n10<\/td>\n4<\/td>\n18<\/td>\n32<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Ontario<\/strong><\/td>\n8<\/td>\n8<\/td>\n12<\/td>\n28<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Manitoba<\/strong><\/td>\n1<\/td>\n4<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n7<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Northwest Territory<\/strong><\/td>\n1<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n0<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Saskatchewan<\/strong><\/td>\n0<\/td>\n3<\/td>\n3<\/td>\n6<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Prince Edward Island<\/strong><\/td>\n0<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
New Brunswick<\/strong><\/td>\n0<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Nova Scotia<\/strong><\/td>\n0<\/td>\n0<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Newfoundland and Labrador<\/strong><\/td>\n0<\/td>\n0<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tomorrow, the senior athletes will be under the spotlight for the last day of the event. Watch the live streaming and see live results at\u00a0JUDOCANADA.TV<\/a>.<\/p>\n

-30-<\/p>\n

Written by Sarah\u00a0Mailhot for Judo Canada<\/p>\n

Information:
\nPatrick\u00a0Esparb\u00e8s
\nChief Operating Officer
\n(514)\u00a0668-6279
\nP.ESPARBES@JUDOCANADA.ORG<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Edmonton, May\u00a018, 2019 \u2013 The U16 and U21\u00a0athletes were in action on the mats of the Butterdome at the University of Alberta, in Edmonton, for the Canadian Open Judo Championships. For\u00a0Kelly\u00a0Deguchi, it was a first competition experience in Canada. At 20\u00a0years old, Christa\u00a0Deguchi\u2019s younger sister decided to follow her footsteps and recently chose the Lethbridge(…)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5227,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,11,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-events","category-feature","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5226"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5226\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5229,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5226\/revisions\/5229"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/judoalberta.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}