Judo Pan Am competition with positive results

If we take a look to the general picture, it does not look good the performance of Cuba’s main judokas at the Pan American tournament held in Brazil last weekend. In the end, Cuba just earned one gold medal. But the result, as a whole, was great since two of our women judokas earned their tickets for Paris 2024.

Both achieved the bronze medal, but either Maylín del Toro (63kg) and Idalys Ortiz (+78kg) have almost granted their attendance to the Olympics.

Both were standing close to those privileged top 17 spots. But they are now in.

Maylín is now ranked 20th with 2,786 points and Idalys ranks 21st, 2,613, but let’s remember is only one spot for athletes from the same country. That is why, so far, they are both in.

In any case, they cannot pin too much hope on that as there are left still some important events on the calendar easy yet because there are some important events left on the calendar. Maylín is just 300 points ahead of the limit meanwhile Idalys does own a more comfortable advantage, over 1,000 points.

The event was quite positive for Jonathan Charón (60kg) and Orlando Polanco (66kg), as both were required to perform well to keep their hopes alive. Both won the bronze medal.

Before the Pan American competition, Charón ranked 44th with 1,003 points and the 17th seed owned 1,640, while Polanco ranked 41st with 1,368, and his bar was up to 2,036.

Charón improved to the 40th spot with 1,353. However, his goal extended the lead and now owns 2,072. Polanco climbed up to the 38th position with 1,620 and the dreamed spot is set at 2,049.

With these performances, both earned their right to continue fighting in other events in which the Cuban judo team is scheduled to compete: Grand Slams in Tajikistan (May 3-5) and Kazakhstan (May 10-12) as well as Abu Dhabi World Championship (May 19-23).

Iván Silva (90kg) and Andy Granda (+100kg), our main medal candidates, remain confident and their goal is to add to improve in the draw under the five rings, but their spots are guaranteed.

The desertion of Magdiel Estrada (73kg) prevented us from having another safe man and also definitively erased the possibility of adding a place as a team, a remote possibility but also possible to increase the roster.

Now, to fulfill the purpose of having five judokas in Paris, Charón and Polanco would have to shine in one of the remaining tournaments, and due to the events lineup, this seems complicated. However, they are extra motivated after what happened in Brazil and who knows, perhaps they surprise us.

Translated by Sergio A. Paneque Díaz / CubaSí Translation Staff