SAN FERNANDO, PAMPANGA — Host Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia all bagged two golds each to open the curtains of the 30th Southeast Asian Games Judo championships, Thursday at the Laus Group Events Centre.
The star of opening day was without a doubt 23-year-old Filipino-Japanese judoka Kiyomi Watanabe.
“Thank you for the support. The support from the home crowd was great,” said Watanabe.
The 23-year-old product of Waseda University won her fourth straight SEA Games gold, sweeping minus-63kg division, 2-0. Watanabe dominated Malaysia’s Nik Norlydiawati Nik Azman then Myanmar’s Chu Myat Noe Wai via two quick ippons.
Sharing the limelight with Watanabe was 22-year-old Shugen Nakano. Nakano defeated Indonesia’s Budi Prasetiyo with an ippon 3:43 into the round to win the gold in the -66kg division.
“Dahil sa suporta ng mga Pilipino kaya ako naka-gold. ‘Yung lakas ko, nanggaling talaga sa mga suporta. Mabuhay ang Pilipinas!” said Nakano, who won bronze back in 2017 during the Kuala Lumpur games.
On the other hand, Thailand’s Masayuki Terada kept his domain of the men’s -81kg while Philippines’ Gilbert Ramirez took home the silver in the same weight category. Meanwhile, Terada’s compatriot Kachakom Warasiha won her first-ever SEA Games gold by taking down the -52kg division.
Terada swept his division, 2-0, while Warasiha needed just one minute and 32 seconds to defeat Myanmar’s Khin Khin Su in the finals.
Indonesia’s Iksan Apriyadi and Ni Kaek Anny Pandini both won their second SEA Games golds after ruling over the -52 and -57kg, respectively.
Taking home silver in -57 was Vietnam’s Thi Bich Ngoc Nguyen.
Winning bronze in each division were the Philippines’ Khrizzie Pabulayan and Thi Thanh Thuy Nguyen in -52; Philippines’ Rena Furukawa in -57; Myanmar’s Aung Zayar Thun and Thailand’s Surasak Puntanam in -66; and Singapore’s Ace Ang and Philippines’ Keisei Nakano for -73.
