T&T’s Gabriella Wood, this country’s lone judo hopeful for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics failed to get past her first opponent at the seven-day 2021 Judo World Championships at the Laszlo Papp Budapest Sports Arena on Saturday.
Competing in the +79kg division, the 23-year-old Wood was beaten in her opening round fight, the second round by Anzhela Gasparian of the Russian Judo Federation (RJF).
Her competitor who is ranked at 38th in the world was able to execute an Ippon throw (where an athlete is subdued on their back) to win the Group A match against Gabriella, who is ranked at 72nd in the world.
Gasparian went on to fight the World and Olympic champion Idalys Ortiz (Cuba), in the next round.
Ortiz then went on to win the fifth position in the group. The overall winner of the category was Sarah Asahina (Japan).
The outcome of Saturday's match does not affect Wood’s holding onto the Olympic slot for the Pan American region and the T&T Judo Federation will now have to await the final adjudication by the International Judo Federation (IJF) later this month.
The one-week World Championship also featured competition in seven other categories for both men and women.
The men competed in the 60kg, 66kg, 73kg, 81kg, 90kg, 100kg and +100kg while the women also battled in the 48kg, 52kg, 57kg, 63kg, 70kg, and 78kg while there was also a mixed team division.
This year's competition attracted a large field of 40 athletes competing in the +78kg division.
This meant there were five knock-out rounds of competition before a winner is declared with Wood having a first-round bye.
Gasparian had defeated Mongolian Adiyasuren Amarsaikhan in their first round.