Tokyo Grand Slam 2022: Preview, schedule and stars to watch
The IJF World Tour makes its penultimate stop of the 2022 season as the Grand Slam returns to Tokyo after a five-year hiatus.
Judo is coming home.
The IJF Grand Slam returns to Tokyo for the first time in five years this weekend in what will be the series’ last stop of 2022. The IJF World Tour's final event will be the Jerusalem Masters in December.
On Saturday and Sunday (3-4 December) at the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium, Japan will host its first international judo competition since the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games where the sport’s homeland won a record nine individual gold medals.
Despite the withdrawals of Ono Shohei, Abe Hifumi and Takato Naohisa, five of Japan's reigning Olympic champions will take the tatami: Abe Uta (-52kg), Hamada Shori (-78kg) and Sone Akira (+78kg) from the women’s team, and Nagase Takanori (-81kg) and Aaron Wolf (-100kg) from the men’s.
In what would have been his first bout in the -73kg since last year's Games, Ono pulled out on Monday citing a lack of fitness while Hifumi and Takato are saving themselves for next year's World championships in Doha, Qatar.
As of 28 November, 368 judoka from 64 countries have entered the Tokyo Grand Slam, which counts towards the qualifying race for Paris 2024, that runs through 23 June 2024. The list of participantsincludes Chinese Taipei's first-ever judo Olympic medallist, Yang Yung Wei, the world No. 1 in the men's -60kg.
For the Japanese, any reigning world champion who wins the event qualifies automatically for the 2023 Worlds, taking place from 7-14 May. This is the case of Uta Abe and Horikawa Megumi in the -63kg.
Next year’s Worlds will weigh heavily in the Olympic selection process for Team Japan, who will be feeling the heat from the host country of the next Games: France are the reigning champions in the team event and have the highest judo population in the world.
Schedule: Tokyo Grand Slam 2022
Times are local (JST/GMT+9)
Saturday 3 December
9:30 - Preliminaries
15:30 - Final block
Categories
Women: -57kg, -63kg, -70kg
Men: -73kg, -81kg, -90kg
Sunday 4 December
11:00 - Preliminaries
17:30 - Final block
Categories
Women: -48kg, -52kg - 78kg, +78kg
Men: -60kg, -66kg, -100kg, +100kg