Coming to the Hungarian capital to “
measure himself
” on the road to the big Olympic meeting in Paris in two years, Teddy Riner won his four fights of the day at over 100kg without much difficulty.
Encouraged by the “
Teddy!
Teddy!
» of his relatives, the 33-year-old judoka dominated for the title the Dutchman Jelle Snippe, ten years his junior, who had climbed to the final to everyone's surprise.
He beat his opponent, who moved up from the under 100kg category a year ago, after a quick fight, won by ippon after only 40 seconds.
Riner, a ten-time world champion, had not appeared in international competition since the Tokyo Olympics last summer.
Beaten in the quarter-finals by the Russian Tamerlan Bashaev, he left Japan with an individual bronze medal, offset by a title in the mixed team event.
Since then, he had only participated in the French Team Championships with his PSG club in November 2021 in Perpignan, then in Villebon-sur-Yvette.
This victory will allow him to climb in the hierarchy of his category for the Paris Olympics in 2024, where the most successful judoka in the history of his sport, currently 17th in the world, will aim for a third individual Olympic title, after those won. in London in 2012 then in Rio in 2016.
The Worlds in October
Exempted from the first round, Teddy Riner, displaying 150kg on the scale, entered the fluorescent green tatamis of the Papp Laszlo Arena shortly after noon, to win his recovery fight against the modest Brazilian Joao Cesarino, 146th in the world.
In the next round, the Guadeloupe defeated an opponent of another caliber, the solid Azerbaijani Ushangi Kokauri, 9th in the world rankings and vice-world champion in 2018. He won on penalties after 2'50 '' of combat without having really needed to attack his opponent.
More offensive in the semi-finals, he then dominated the Georgian Gela Zaalishvili, 8th in the world after only 1'24'' of confrontation.
The outcome could have been even faster since the central referee had given ippon to the French after 33 seconds before being disavowed by the table judges.
For his next major meeting, Teddy Riner will line up for the World Championships in October in Uzbekistan, a first since the 2017 Worlds. That year, he went to Marrakech to seek the tenth planetary title of his career, a record.