Montreal, October 20, 2018 – The team representing Canada at the Veteran World Championships in Cancun, in Mexico, is still going strong with an impressive harvest in the last two days. Over 825 judokas from 49 countries were fighting for the world titles in each category. The Canadians won a total of 9 medals with a team of 23 athletes, and 3 of those medals were gold.

Carline Young on the podium Credit: Patrick Lam

Carline Young (F3 -57 kg) and Vitaliy Polyansky (M2 -100 kg) both stood on the highest step of the podium on Saturday. Young finished first after a near-perfect day. Her first-round fight against Swedish Malin Nordin was a walk in the park, her victory being declared after only 55 seconds. Her second fight, against French Marjorie Garcia, was also a victory, this time after over a little over 2 minutes, by waza-ari. In her third fight, her only loss of the day, her opponent, British Fiona Chan, won by waza-ari. Her fourth and final bout, against Italian Andretta Bertone, was won by ippon and declared Young the world champion in her category.

Polyansky was dominating his category all day, leaving his opponents very few occasions to score. He first eliminated French David Thenaisie after 59 seconds, then Brazilian Danial Rocha, and he finished strong, eliminating Algerian Ahmed Kebaili by ippon after 34 seconds.

Vladimir Kostrovets (M4 -73 kg), Artur Targosinski (M5 -73 kg), Ahmed Hellal Cherrak (M4 -100 kg) and Mark Pivovar (M2 +100 kg) will all be bringing home a bronze medal. Pivovar showed he was in great shape in his bronze-medal bout, winning by ippon after a mere 21 seconds.

“Canada is very strong on the international scene with the Veteran team. They aren’t just there as spectators, they are there to perform and win. The Young family was very impressive lately. Carline won a world title today, and her son Keagan won a bronze last week at the Youth Olympic Games and was fighting in the Junior World Championships this week. They prove that there is no age limit to perform, compete and stay in shape!” commented a very pleased Patrick Esparbès, COO for Judo Canada.

Jean Proteau (M5 -66 kg), Lloyd Kratky (M2 -66 kg), Amy Bienert (F1 -63 kg) and Amanda McAlpine (F3 +78 kg) were also in action on the mats, but didn’t get a ranking.

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Written by Sarah Mailhot for Judo Canada

Information:
Patrick Esparbès
Chief Operating Officer
(514) 668-6279
p.esparbes@judocanada.org