If the Premier League ends this year, Serie A tournaments will continue. Among them there were 15 karatekas representing Budo-Nord, and the best result was shown by the Ukrainian Valerii Sonnykh (84 kg), who won the bronze medal.
Kumite in weight up to 84 kg turned out to be one of the most massive participants in the tournament. 96 athletes took to the tatami, including five Budo-Nord karatekas at once: Ukrainians Valerii Sonnykh, Andrii Toroshanko, Konstiantyn Tsymbal, Mads Viberg Larsen and Krzysztof Malachowsky from Poland.
Sonnykh started with a confident victory over Noah Najdy from the Netherlands (4:0), after which he defeated Finn Niko Mantere. In the third round, Valerii defeated the Iranian Amir Eslami (1:1), and then defeated the representative of France Abdesselem Raybak – 3:0. In the quarterfinals, Sonnykh defeated the Mads Wiberg Larsen (6:2) and continued to fight for medals. In the semi-finals, the Ukrainian was opposed by another Iranian karateka Mahdi Khodabakhshi.
Valerii lost the fight with a difference of two points (1:3) and switched to the fight for bronze. The small final against the Frenchman Issa Lardjoum became a real thriller: the rivals struck each other with a total of 22 effective blows, and at the end of the meeting the numbers on the scoreboard were 11:11. Sonnykh was able to win bronze and ended his performance in Kocaeli on a positive note.
In turn, Andrii Toroshanko lost to the Frenchman Dani Makamata (0:1) in the first fight, and Konstiantyn Tsymbal lost to Alireza Akbari from Iran in the opening match. As for Krzysztof Malachowski, the Pole first beat Daniel Fotsing from Cameroon (4:2), and in the next round turned out to be stronger than the Indian Gursangam Singh – 4:0. But in the third fight, Malachowski lost to the Egyptian Mohamed Sameh (0:4), completing the tournament.
Also, three victories in the tournament were on the account of Mads Viberg. The Dane took turns defeating Michal Florczak from Poland (6:1), Iranian Ali Karami (5:4) and Egyptian Mohamed Ali Abubakr – 3:1. But the quarterfinal duel of two representatives of “Budo-Nord” Wiberg and Sonnykh ended in favor of the Ukrainian (2:6), and Serie A for Wiberg was completed.
In women’s kumite up to 61 kg Danish Trine Fuyu Lind made her debut duel against Berna Allison from Luxembourg with a score of 1:1. The score was in favor of the opponent who went further. And Anna Heiko from Ukraine managed to hold two meetings: she won against Isik Selin from Germany, and then lost to Noursin Ali. Moreover, in both fights, the score was never opened, and everything was decided by the decisions of the referee.
In the weight category up to 50 kg, Budo-Nord karatekas also held a total of five meetings. Valeriia Bychenkova overcame the first round, beating Ngan Cheung from Hong Kong, but then lost to Turkish Nur Selva Akkurt – 0:6. And Bychenkova’s partner in the Ukrainian national team, Olha Vasylenko, lost in the opening match to Cypriot Elina Papageorgiou – 0:1. The Swiss Kars Nur was able to pass one stage, beating the owner of the tatami Ayse Yilmaz – 6:0. But then she lost to Nisham Attiya from Egypt – 0:1.
And in the category up to 55 kg, the athletes of “Budo-Nord” were in the same group. Ukrainian Anastasiia Potapchyk could not get past the owner of the tatami Gulsen Demirturk (0:5), and Constance Matos (Portugal) started with a victory over Francesca Cavallaro from Italy (0:0), but then lost to Iranian Fatemeh Saadati – 0:3. In turn, Abdul Jamil Syarulniza from Malaysia lost in the first round to Sodeh Khalili – 3:6.
The Portuguese Fernandes Bernardo Pineu (75 kg) in the first fight of the tournament was able to get ahead of Saman Edalati from Iran (2:2), and then Betim Maligi from Kosovo with a difference of one point – 3:4.
Another Budo-Nord karateka Denys Kopytko (67 kg) had two matches in Kocaeli. At first, he achieved a victory over Turk Omer Gul (1:1), but in the next round he lost to Nasreddine Ajaray from Belgium – 2:2.
Mia Kadoic (+68 kg) from Switzerland lost 1:3 in the first stage bout to Maryam Sewidan from Egypt, ending her participation in the tournament.
In general, Serie A turned out to be quite interesting. In men’s kumite, Iran won two golds – Mahdi Khodabakhshi (84 kg) and Mahmoud Nemati (84+ kg) won. At the same time, the Egyptian team became the first among women in kata, and Ola Elmadany (68 kg) brought another gold award to the national team of this country.
Serie A’s next stop will be Jakarta, which will host the tournament on November 18-20.
Read more about the World Karate Federation (WKF) and Karate1 in Kocaeli.
Read more about Baku Premier League.