Ueno mints gold again, as Ota foiled for silver

Thursday 14th August, 06:42 AM JST

BEIJING —

Japan struck women’s judo gold for a second successive day in blistering fashion Wednesday as defending Olympic champion Masae Ueno upended Cuba’s Anaysi Hernandez in the 70-kilogram final, while unheralded swordsman Yuki Ota picked up a silver in the men’s individual foil for Japan’s first ever medal in fencing. Following Ayumi Tanimoto’s speedy retention of her Olympic title in the 63-kg class final on Tuesday, Ueno completed the defense of her own title even more quickly, taking all of six seconds to pull the Cuban’s legs from under her for an emphatic ippon victory. ‘‘I thought it was an ippon but my opponent was still hanging on to me, so I thought maybe it wasn’t a full score and went for a hold. When I looked at the scoreboard I saw it was ippon,’’ said Ueno, who had considered retiring following a first-round exit at the 2005 world championships. But she determined to claw her way back to the top, despite struggling with injuries. ‘‘I was happier with my win in Athens, but this time I feel I really exerted myself to the full extent,’’ she said. ‘‘I feel relieved and very satisfied.’’ But it was again a different story for the Japanese men, as Athens Olympic silver medalist Hiroshi Izumi saw his gold medal bid end in a second-round loss to Andrei Kazusenok of Belarus in the men’s 90 kg. Irakli Tsirekidze of Georgia beat Algeria’s Amar Benikhlef for the gold.

At the beginning of the day there was little to suggest a Japanese fencer would make the medals podium. Kenta Chida won his first bout in the men’s foil but was knocked out by Germany’s Benjamin Philip Kleibrink in his second, while in the women’s individual epee Megumi Harada also fell in her second bout. But Ota, a ninth-place finisher at the 2004 Athens Games, quickly dispensed with Brazil’s Joao Antonio Souza 15-4 in his first match, before outpointing Choi Byung Chul of South Korea 15-14. He then put himself into medal contention with a 15-12 win over Germany’s Peter Joppich to become the first Japanese to reach a fencing semifinal.
Ota book his passage into the final with a 15-14 victory over Athens Olympic silver medalist Salvatore Sanzo of Italy, before being foiled by the left-hander Kleibrink in the battle for gold.
‘‘I’m simply pleased with this,’’ said Ota. ‘‘I haven’t even had a top-four result in any of the World Cup events thus far this year but I finished runner-up in the Olympics, meaning that I was able to regain my form.’’ ‘‘But I’m feeling frustrated as a man with the fact that I was beaten again by an opponent who has kept beating me,’’ he said of Kleibrink. ‘‘To be honest, I was tired in the final after going through all those tough matches. I could not digest what my coach said (during the final) and Kleibrink was speedy and executed pretty smart attacks.’’

Kyodo