Lisbon has opened it’s doors already this year for major championships but in the next week will see over 650 judoka to compete in the Veteran and Kata World Championships.
Some haven’t seen each other since this pandemic began and in the case of kata, even competed online via video entry. This feels like a long time coming and will undoubtedly serve an incredible atmosphere with all returning to something like normal.
Veterans are up first starting on the Thursday, the host nation has the largest team of 47 but is closely rivalled by Algeria and Ukraine who both have 40 entries followed by Kazakhstan and France with 35 and 33 respectively.
Compared to the 2019 Kata World Championships, there are 50 more judoka inscribed this year and we continue to see the standard increase across our continent with more and more moving from European championships to the world circuit.
We wish both the athletes and the hosts, Portugal, a fantastic week of judo!
Information for the Veteran World Championships can be found here; https://live.ijf.org/wc_vet2021/overview as well as information for Kata World Championships also at live.ijf here; https://live.ijf.org/wc_kata2021/overview.
Author: Thea Cowen