Quebec judoka Louis Krieber-Gagnon had a day of two victories and two defeats on Saturday at the Perth Open, which still brought him very close to getting on the podium in Australia.
In action in the under 90 kg category, the Montrealer easily got the better of Eljan Hajiyev, from Azerbaijan, after obtaining a bye in the first round. Krieber-Gagnon, however, lost in the next fight, in the quarterfinals, against Sungho Lee of South Korea.
Relegated to the repechage, the 27-year-old judoka did not give up and won his duel against the Czech David Klammert. In the final for the bronze medal pitting him against Briton Jamal Petgrave, Krieber-Gagnon was unfortunately unable to win, seeing his opponent achieve a waza-ari which was enough for Victory. The Quebecer then finished fifth in the category.
In action on Friday, Julien Frascadore wanted to get on the podium once again, having won silver at the Pan American Games in Santiago at the end of October. In the under 66 kg category, he started his day convincingly with a quick victory in the first round against the Ghanaian Dominic Agudoo, then he followed up with a second victory against the Colombian Juan Hernandez.
It was in the quarter-final that things got tough for the 23-year-old athlete, who considered having mismanaged the end of his fight which pitted him against Finnish Luukas Saha, eventual silver medalist of the day.
“I had a waza-ari with 30 seconds left in the fight, then I couldn’t manage the end of the fight and I lost on overtime penalties. I was disappointed because it was a fight that I dominated and that I should have won,” he commented.
This defeat took Frascadore to the repechage against Mattia Miceli of Italy, where he also had to admit defeat in the final moments of the duel, which ranked him seventh at the end of the day.
“It was a very tactical fight and he took me down for a waza-ari with little time on the board. Once again, it was a fight that was within reach. In general today (Friday), it was not my best performance nor the desired result, but I still managed to get some good experience with four fights. »
In the under 52 kg draw, Alberta’s Kelly Deguchi lost in a curtain-raiser to Hsu-Wan-Chu Lin of Taipei.
Benefiting from a bye in the first round in the over 100 kg category, Marc Deschênes also lost his first fight in front of the representative of Slovenia, Vito Dragic.