Montréal, April 25, 2014 – Quebecois judokas Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard, Antoine Bouchard, Etienne Briand, Patrick Gagné and Alexis Morin-Martel all came ever so close to a podium finish, Friday, at the Pan-American Championships being presented in Guayaquil, Ecuador. After losing in their respective bronze medal matches, all five athletes walked away from the competition with 5^th place classifications.

In action in the under 66 kg class, Antoine Bouchard began his tourney with victories over the Ecuadorian Jaime Rendom, the Venezuelan Segio Mattey and the American Bradford Bollen. In the semi-finals, the Quebecer was taken down by the 3rd ranked judoka in the world, the Brazilian Charles Chibana. In the bronze medal bout, Bouchard succumbed to defeat versus the Cuban Gilberto Armas.

In the same category, Patrick Gagné took down in successive fights the Mexican Jesus Chaporro and the Argentinian Fernando Gonzalez before falling to the Peruvian Alonso Wang. He would go on to lose his final combat, this time at the hands of the Dominican Wander Mateo.

In the under 73 kg division, Etienne Briand would get things going with a win over the Salvadorian Carlos Figueroa, followed by a victory over his teammate Alexis Morin-Martel, who previously took down the Colombian Luis Galindo in the first round. Briand would unfortunately go on to suffer back-to-back losses to end his tourney, falling to the Brazilian Alex Pombo and the Ecuadorian Fernando Ibanez.

As for Morin-Martel, he would go on to win his first match in the repechage, defeating the Puerto Rican Augusto Miranda. In the bronze medal match, the American Nicholas Delpopolo would go on to beat the Quebecer, climbing the podium in the process.

On the women’s side, Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard came away with the best Canadian result, finishing 5th in the under 57 kg category. The Quebecoise won her first bout of the day versus the Mexican Andrea Ayala before falling at the hands of the Brazilian Ketleyn Quadros.

Beauchemin-Pinard regained her composure with a win in the repechage over the Argentinian Melissa Rodriguez. In her bout for the bronze medal, she would come up short against the Cuban Aliuska Ojeda. Earlier in the day, Ojeda had managed an upset victory over the Quebecoise Stéphanie Tremblay in her first bout of the tournament.

Finally, in the under 48 kg class, Audrée Françis Méthot was taken down by her first opponent, the Mexican Edna Carrillo. Also competing in this category, the Ontarian Lea Sheffield suffered a similar fate, losing in the first round to the Cuban Maria Celia Laborde.

The Pan-American Championships will continue Saturday in Guayaquil. Béatrice Valois-Fortier, Kelita Zupancic, Monika Burgess, Catherine Roberge, Ana Lara Portuondo-Isasi will be the ones to watch on the women’s side. As for the men, Canadians Antoine Valois-Fortier, Louis Krieber-Gagnon, Brandon Jobb, Kyle Reyes, Dilyaver Sheykhilyamov and Ignacio Rodriguez will all be in action.

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Written by Sportcom for Judo Canada