Raúl Bouzas and Joel González won the Gold Medals for Spain during the last day of the Taekondo U21 Championship

Vigo, 8th of November.  Joel González (Cataluña) and Raúl Bouzas (Galicia) saved the Spanish team during the last great day of the First European Taekwondo U21 Championship. Both athletes did a perfect performance in their fights after two days with no first positions for Spain.

            Regarding the middleweight (-84 Kg), Juan Méndez won against the Slovenian,  Alen Begic (11-9) and in the quarterfinals he overcame the Latvian Sergey Paradnik (4-0), but during semifinals the Russian Aydemir Shakhbanov (5-11) in a fight won easily by the ex-sovietic who was winning with 0-6 from the very beginning.

            Afterwards, happiness arrived when Raúl Bouzas, form the Olimpic Vilagarcía (-72 Kg) was the first one registering the best results of the three days. Bouzas was overwhelming the athlete from Azerbaijan, Elvin Mammadov (5-4), also Andrei Hrabouski from Belarus (10-7) and, during the quarterfinals, he overcame the athlete from Serbia, Aleksandr Jankovic (9-1), getting six points from two kicks in the head so winning 7-1 after the two first minutes. Then, Bouzas, had bronze medal for sure when he faced the German, Jens Leewen. During that fight the Galician athlete started 1-0 but the German fighter made two kicks in the head, which gave him 6 points. After the 2nd round the situation for the Galician athlete was complicated but, supported by the fans in the Sports Hall he got to the end of the 3rd round with 10-10.

            So they had to fight the Gold Round. People were excited. The definitive fight started with lots of scores and then... at the 33 seconds, the kick of the victory arrived and Spain was in the final.

            During the final, the Dutch, Joel Remak, after overwhelming Vasili Enachi (Moldavia), Tommi Ojanen (Finland) and Ridvan Akin (Turkey) started with a score of 1-0, and in just 70 seconds the result was 4.1. Raúl Bouzas, supported by fans,  finished the 1st round with the control of the fight, (4-5). The 2nd round would be much more complicated and the during the 3rd one Joel tried to control the situation but he couldnt (5-8), it was too late. Bouzas was the winner and he felt into his fans arms.

            The final fight of the flyweight (-58 Kg) did not have such emotion because Joel González is  supreme. He became Absolute Worldchampion in the same category last October during the Worldchampionship in Copenhague and he proved his skills by getting results such as: 12-0 with the German, Denis Roskoch, 13-1 against Djordy Janmaat (Holland) and 8-5 with the Armenian, Hajkaz Samvelyan. In the final, against the Ucranian Shami Sadygov, he had the control at all times  (1st round, 4-1, 2nd round 6-1 and 4-0 during the 3rd round). He ended up the final by using the spinning technique. Easy for him.  

The Spanish girls won two bronze medals during the Taekwondo U21 Championship after being knocked out by the ones who became winners afterwards

Vigo, 8th of November. Spain was near to get two more gold medals in the feminine category thanks to the Catalonian Zaira Rivera (-51 Kg) and Sandra Lorenzo (-72 Kg), from Madrid, although once again she had to leave with a bittersweet flavour. Besides, the Galician , Lara Ouviña (-59, feather) was overwhelming in the quareterfinals by the champion,  the Italian sportswoman,  Zocco.

            Regarding flyweight, Zaira overcame the Hungarian Kristina Sikesdi (8-6) and also Sandra Christensen, from Denmark (11-9). However she saw the end when she fought against the French, Yasmina Aziez (7-19) in the semifinals. Afterwards, Azeiz got the gold medal by winning in the last seconds of a very exciting fight against Manuel Bezzola, Switerzland.

            Concerning middleweight, Lorenzo succeded in the 1st round with Zorica Sejic from Serbia (21-5) and in quareterfinals she overcame the Portuguese sportswoman, Patricia Almeida (38-7) although in semifinals she had to leave her place in finals to the Russian Anastasia Baryshnikova (4-16), who became winner in the Gold Round that she fought against Reshmie Ooginka (silver medal).

            Meanwhile, Lara Ouviña (Ribeira) played a very important role. She destroyed in the 1st round the portuguese athlete, Ines Isabel Velez (15-3) and she finished her performance with and adverse 6-13 against the Italian: Margherita Zocco.

Joel González, World Champion, gets into the action during the final part of the European Championships U-21, with two Galicians in the court  

Vigo, 7th November. The final part of the European Championships U-21 will bring new medal options to the Spanish team and, above all, to the Galicial taekwondists. The Catalonian Joel González, Absolute World Champion in Copenhagen 2009, will try to close the year with a continental award in -58 (Fly).

On the other hand, Raúl Bouzas (-72, Light), from Vilagarcía, also intends to achieve the most precious metal. Andrea Rica, a taekwondist from Vigo with a grant at the CAR (acronym in Spanish for “Centre for High Performance Sports”) in Barcelona, had already pointed at him as the most likely winner of the medal, since he had already been with the absolute team during the World Championships in Denmark. The third Spanish taekwondist is Juan Méndez (-84, Middle).

Regarding to the female division, Zaira Rivera will have a difficult task to complete in Fly weight (-51). The French Yasmina Aziez has already competed in the last World Championships in Copenhagen, while the Swiss Manuel Bezzola, who won the gold medal during the World University Games (Universiade of Belgrade) and is the favourite in Vigo.  

Lara Ouviña (-59, Feather), from Ribeira, is the last shot of the Spanish team in the female division. Blocking her way towards the medals, she might find the Norwegian Cindy Moe Ortega, who has been to the Championships in Denmark and with whom, in theory, she should only fight during the semi-final. But before that Lara will have to endure two other fights.

Sandra Lorezo (-72, Middle) is in a difficult situation, too. The Turkish Furkan Asena Aydin is the current European Junior Champion in heavyweight division (+68). The Dutchwoman Reshmie Oogink achieved the bronze at the Universiade of Belgrade.

Turkey stood in the way of Spain during two final battles and the Spanish team closed with three bronze medals

Vigo, 7th November. Spain went from happiness to despair in only half an hour. Five minutes before half past five in the afternoon, at the Courts 1 and 2 of the Travesas Pavillion, everyone hoped for two possible female finalists: Raquel Menéndez (-67, Welter), from Madrid, and the Catalonian Anna Casabella (-55, Batam). Neither of them could defeat the Turkish Nur and the German Kopf, even though Casabella was able to break the tie after a combat with much kicking (10-10) three seconds before the end. Finally she lost the fight, after having almost reached the victory in two different ocassions (4-3, 6-5).

Menéndez’s case was even worse. This year, the Tuskish won the European Junior Championship in Trelleborg, (-68, Welter), the Spanish did not have a chance and lost 0-5. in this way, Nur became the first Junior European Champion who got into a continental final U-21.

Almost thirty minutes later, the second Turkish blow came in the male division in this second day, when there was a better atmosphere in the stands than on Friday. Raúl Martínez got to semi-finals much to the regret of the Swiss Flamur Zuberi (12-5) and the Russian Ruslan Dazhigov (7-4). Baris Bozkurt was waiting for him, and during the first round the Spanish succeeded in hiting his head, which put the Turkish in a hotspot (1-3). However, the Turkish did not surrender and he tied the fight in the following two minutes (4-4). Another kick to the head of the Turkish made a score of 4-7, and propelled Spain to the final. The Turkish coach complained, but the video did not agree with his opinion. Everything was set... but the rival was Turkish. There was no surrender, and they reduced the difference kick by kick. They were level at 14 seconds to the end. But then, one second before the end, the Spanish taekwondist was defeated by a kick, 8-7.

The other Spanish sportsmen and women abandoned the competition already during the morning. José Fernández (-67, Feather), from A Coruña, who was exempt from the first part of the competition, defeated the French Belhadj (9-8), but then lost against Gülec Tahir, German of Turkish extraction. Sabela Lonja (-63, Light), from Sada, lost against Gunay Aghakisiyeva (Azerbaijan), who sealed a narrow victory of 6-7. And Borja Ríos (-62, Batan) started very promising (6-1 against the Fishish Sami Lahtinen), continued suffering (14-13 against the Belgian Melvin Willems) and closed agains the Georgian Aleksandre Usharauli (3-4), who would later win the bronze.

Two days and Spain bites medals which are not made of gold.

Nothing can scape from the video replay 

The way that the actions in the taekwondo fights are judged in the Europen Taekwondo Championship U21 that takes place in Vigo, started last summer in Azerbaijan, during the Bakú Worldcup, and it is a completely new way of judging.

The “video replay” acts when an athlete thinks that the result of the fight is wrong. Each competitor has two cards for all the competition, that allow him to aks for two revisions, so the coach has to be very sure if he wants to ask the referee for a revision, because if the coach makes a mistake, he loses an opportunity. If the coach is right, he keeps the two cards and that means that he can ask for all the revisions he wants , and he won’t loose any cards.

The knocks that are checked the most, are the ones involving spinning techniques, because they add two points, but in this case, the hogu just register one, so the referee has to be the one who adds one more point. Kicks on the head are also usually checked, because there is no sensors in the helmet, and that kind of knocks add three points if the referee notice them.

Three Galicians will compete tomorrow in the second day of the European Taekwondo Championships 
 

Vigo, 6th of November. The European Taekwondo Championships Sub 21 will have the 2nd day after the opening ceremony celebration in “As Travesas” Sports hall. The 2nd day, Borja Ríos (-62), Sabela Lonja (-63) and José Fernández (-68), all of them Galician sportsmen and woman, and Anna Casabella (-55), Raquel Menéndez (-67) and Raúl Martínez (-78), (Spanish competitors) will try to increase the number of medals.  

The fights will start at 09.00 a.m with qualifying rounds in the morning and they will finish around 18.30 p.m with six finals. 

Furthermore, in the second day, the Club Yidam from Vigo will make an exhibition at 17.00 p.m, which will please all spectators, as it did the exhibition done on the inauguration.  

Silver and bronze medals for the Spanish delegation on the first day of the under-21 European competition of Taekwondo, although the clear domination of Turkey.

Vigo.November 6th _ The bronze medals of Samuel González and Elena Gómez (+72 Kl) helped the Spanish delegation to overcome the first day of competition on which their results were rather disappointing. Contrary to the Turkish delegation that won the three gold medals in the female category and one gold medal in the male category; finally, they got five medalls and just the Russian delegation could block their light with two gold and three bronze medals.

In the morning session took place the qualifying rounds; the only galician competitor of the day, Pablo Carou (Fin -54 Kl ) lost the gold medal against the Polish competitor Eryk Rodzik. He was not the only one: Joel Catalina (Heavy +84 Kl) lost against Yuri Kirichenko (Russia) in quarter finals with a clear victory 26-9. Finally, Kirichengo managed to get the gold medal after winning against the Ottoman Duztepe in semifinals (13-7) and against the German Meyer in the final round (10-4).

At this point of the competition, Spanish hopes were focused in González (-50 Semifin). It was a long session for him ( the largest participation of the day with 17 competitors), He won against the Portuguese Joel Martins (15-10), the Moldavian Petru Labunet (12-9) and the Turkish Omer Aksoy (20-14). But he was beated by the Russian Kashtanov (15-16). The fight was clearly controlled by the ex-Soviet (3-2, 10-4) but González start ted a recovery and reach the last 15 seconds with a small advantage (13-14). We were reaching the end of the fight, but unfortunately 4 seconds before the end, the Russian tied 15-15; and finally in a enraged attack wich Ismael tried to defend, Roman kicked for the point of the victory and reached this way the final round. He threw up his hands in astonishment. Then, Kashtanov who eliminate the Georgian Japaridze (17-13) and the Bielorrusian Kokshyntsau (16-2), achieve without any problems the gold medal against the Ucranian Oleksandr Babenko (13-5).

In the female category, Jone Lizaso lost against the Ucranian Zholobaylo (19-15) in Semifin (-43 Kl); Paula Benes was eliminated too by Emilie Tran (12-5) in Fin (-47 Kl) and just Elena Gómez reach a final.

The catalan fought in a semifinal (with 6 competitors in the category) against the French Maeva Mellier and beated her easily 17-6. Her rival in the final was the Turkish Busra Yildiz who had already won her fight against Katarina Weiss, from Germany (9-7). The final fight seem to be equalled at first, although the victory was clearly Ottoman. The first point was Turkish (1-0), a kick from Gómez achieve the tie (1-1) and it lasted just a few seconds (2-1); this was the end of the first round. In the second one Yildiz was leading the fight and reached the gloomy score of 6-1; the Spanish delegation did not stop encouraging and cheering Elena up; she answered with a great kick on the head of her rival (three points and 6-4 ). Ylidiz was increasing her score point by point (8-4) and with 49 seconds less the decisive action: another kick on the head and 8-7...an action which the Ottoman coach protested about. The video record confirmed the Turkish team was right and the scoreboard went back to 8-4. It was done; four more kicks to Gómez and the medal flew back to Turkey.