Korea rounds off judo schedule with more bronze in mixed team event

Korea beat Germany in the judo mixed team bronze medal match at the Paris Olympics on Saturday after an extra seventh match, winning the country’s first medal in the mixed team event and ending this year’s Games with five medals in judo

Korean judoka Lee Lee Joon-hwan, left, competes against Eduard Trippel of Germany in the mixed team bronze medal match at the Paris Olympics at the Champ-de-Mars Arena in Paris on Saturday. [NEWS1]

Korea beat Germany in the judo mixed team bronze medal match at the Paris Olympics on Saturday after an extra seventh match, winning the country’s first medal in the mixed team event and ending this year’s Games with five medals in judo.

In the mixed team event, first introduced at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, each side is composed of three male and three female judokas divided into three categories. The event runs with a best-of-six format. In case of a tie at 3-3, a random weight category is selected for a final bout to determine the winner.

Lee Joon-hwan in the men’s -90 kilogram was up first against Eduard Trippel at the Champ-de-Mars Arena in Paris, but lost by an ippon. Kim Ha-yun in the women’s +70 kilogram went next, tying the overall score by beating Renee Lucht with an ippon.

Kim Min-jong then beat Erik Abramov with an ippon in the men’s +90 kilogram, passing the baton to Huh Mi-mi in the women’s -57 kilogram.

Huh also won her match against Pauline Starke by an ippon, leaving An Ba-ul in the men’s -73 kilogram to win his match against Igor Wandtke to seal Korea’s victory early, before the women’s -70 kilogram match between Kim Ji-su and Miriam Butkereit.

The match between An and Wandtke turned out to be fierce, going into golden score, judo's sudden-death overtime during which the first person to score an ippon or waza-ari becomes the winner.

An failed to seal a victory after allowing a waza-ari, passing the baton to Kim Ji-su. But Kim also lost by an ippon, tying the score at 3-3 and forcing one random weight category match.

The men’s -73 kilogram category was selected, with An facing Wandtke again.

The match was neck-and-neck until Wandtke received three shidos — given for any rule violation and sometimes called a yellow card — resulting in an automatic victory for An.

A shido is given for any rule violation like not attacking enough, intentionally stepping out of bounds, playing too defensively or putting a hand on the opponent’s face. A third shido results in a victory for the opponent.

Saturday’s mixed team event wraps up the judo schedule at this year’s Olympics for Korea. Korea ends with five medals — two silver and three bronze — in the sport.

BY PAIK JI-HWAN [paik.jihwan@joongang.co.kr]