Winning Abe by 2-1, I feel she is dominant in both 48kg & 52kg classes. I think the Japanese Judo Federation pushes her to 48kg so that Abe can dominate in 52kg, and also 2 medals for Japan Women team in any Judo championship. It is rare to find 2 very good judokas of the same weight class.
It ssems that in the later years she almost exclusively narrowed her technique to tomonage and newaza. But prior to that she had a bigger repertoire but more varied results -- still great but not dominant. Wonder why? And there's an earlier comment that the Japanese pushed her to -48kg to have 2 golds. She does look a little thin in the cheeks compared to her earlier weight class.
I didn’t see a lot of judo at the current olympics but I like how she doesn’t just try for the ippon but uses the full range of waza for a win. She’s especially strong at the ne waza. Nice to see. The bout between the Canadian and Korean judoka females was frustrating. Korean kept dropping to avoid ippon. She ultimately got DQ’d for that but it wasn’t a satisfying win for the Canadian.
