Judo teams in Bonn at the DHM

Silver for ladies in individual competition

On the first day of the competition the individual competitions were held with partly very close decisions. Melanie Gallmeier (-48 kg) and Luisa Froitzheim (+78 kg) had to admit defeat only in the final after a terrific tournament course and were rewarded for it in each case with the silver medal and the nomination to the EUC in Coimbra/Portugal.

After very strong tournament performances, Annemarie Schmidt (-52 kg), Patricia Bauer (-57 kg) and Jennifer Uhlig (+78 kg) were unfortunately unable to prevail in the small final and thus narrowly missed out on the bronze medal.

Angelika Schulz achieved a good 7th place.

Strong cohesion of the Karlsruhe teams

On the next day, the team competitions took place, where the university groups could once again prove how great their cohesion is.

The beginning was made by our men's team of the all category, which was not very conspicuous on the previous fighting day.

All category means that all competitors admitted in the individual competition were also eligible to start. In the Newcomers Cup, only lower-graded athletes up to and including 3rd Kyu (green belt) were allowed to start.

After a rather unspectacular opening fight against the WG Regensburg, "our boys" had to fight directly against the Uni Nuremberg-Erlangen, who had arrived with numerous fighters of the first national league team TV 1848 Erlangen. After five exciting fights Karlsruhe could also win this encounter. The next fight was against WG Cologne, who were no match for them on this day.

In the hope round the men's team met WG Bochum. Last year, WG Karlsruhe lost to WG Bochum in the final for tactical reasons and that had to be avoided at all costs this time. After a long poker game and the search for the best plan, the men's team Karlsruhe was eliminated by a narrow margin. Nevertheless, a really strong 7th place for the men's team!

Next, the newcomer men entered the tatami. After a walk-through, they unfortunately met the title favorites from Rostock in their first round. After five brave fights they had to admit defeat. But not all was lost.

With the knowledge of the mistakes in the last fight and a little more self-confidence, our beginners were able to win against the WG Bochum and the host WG Bonn.

In the small final it was again extremely exciting and again our athletes just missed the podium.

After a somewhat luckless day so far, our ladies went to the start. In the opening round they unfortunately lost out to the strong women from Aachen, but were able to fight their way back to the front in the second round. Here they defeated the teams of WG Hannover and WG Würzburg in superior style. In the small final, no one wanted to leave anything to chance and consequently everyone was highly motivated and concentrated in the fights, so that the WG Karlsruhe was able to defeat the Uni Bielefeld 4:1. Congratulations to the bronze medal!

In addition, we had a hot iron in the fire with the newcomer ladies, of which no one could yet imagine how hot it would glow.

After the first excitement and uncertainty had passed, our women were able to win the first fight against Bochum and had tasted blood from then on. If a victory was in it, a second one was in it as well. From then on the motivation spiral did not stop and with every victory the gold medal came a little bit closer. In the last fight it was once again close, so that a run-off fight had to be fought, which our beginners could also decide in their favor. Congratulations to the gold medal for the newcomer ladies team!