Iran wins two gold medals at IBSA event in Tashkent

Two Iranian judo athletes won gold medals at the IBSA Judo Grand Prix 2019 on Tuesday in Tashkent. Vahid Nouri seized a gold, throwing Georgian Lasha Kizilashvili at the -90kg B2 category which is remarkable as the Iran Judo Federation is suspended by the International Judo Federation.

The IBSA Grand Prix was held under the leadership of the International Blind Sports Association, IBSA, with the support of the IJF for the technical aspects of the competition, therefor the suspension of Iran Judo Federation announced last week, didn’t affect the participation of athletes from Iran.

Nouri was able to win the event including Oleksandr Nazarenko, the current World and European Champion. He was beaten by done by newcomer Lasha Kizilashvili of Georgia, in a tough battle in the semi-final. Kizilashvili showed a lot of spirit with a high rate of attacks, putting Nazarenko on three shidos. In the final he put Vahid Nouri of Iran on two shidos with the same strategy. But the work rate took its toll and after Kizilashvili ran out of energy, Nouri threw the Georgian with a beautiful left uchi mata to grab the gold. The bronze medal went to Uzbekistan’s Jaloliddin Avazov and Oleksandr Nazarenko from Ukraine.

In the +100kg B2* category Mohammadreza Kheirollahzadeh took the gold to Iran. With a clever turnover, he held down Shirin Sharipov of Uzbekistan for twenty seconds to score the final ippon. Russian Gaidar Gaidarov and Ilham Zakiyev from Azerbaijan won bronze medals.

* B2: Athletes with a B2 sport class have a higher visual acuity than athletes competing in the B1 sport class and/or a visual field of less than five degrees radius.