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Tuesday, 31st July 2012
In Japan Sports News, Sports,

Judoka ditches junk food to take Japan's first gold at Games

A female judoka revealed she packed in a diet of junk food to help her fend off the attacks of her opponents in the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games.

And it seemed to pay off for Kaori Matsumoto, who managed to grasp Japan's first gold medal at the competition after taking out Romania's Corina Caprioriu.

According to a report by Reuters, the Japanese athlete was instructed by her coach to quit her unhealthy eating habits if she wanted a chance at victory at the Games.

Matsumoto was quoted as saying: "I like to eat, especially snacks and ice cream.

"Before, there was a time when I ate too much, so I was told by the coach not to eat any of the snacks and ice cream, so that was really hard for me."

The star came out on top for the under 57kg category, however, her counterparts in the lower weight divisions failed to emulate her success.

Hopefuls Tomoko Fukumi and Misato Nakamura were also favourites for gold in the under 48kg and under 52kg segments respectively, with all three Judokas chosen ahead of Japanese champions, the AFP revealed.

This piled pressure not only on the athletes, but on the team selectors who only saw one out of three of their choices bringing home a medal.

Still, it may have been the generous advice of Fukumi and Nakamura that helped their teammate to success.

Matsumoto said: "Before the final I wasn't saying much because I was getting ready but Fukumi told me 'It's your first time here so just go for it', and Nakamura said 'You're going to get our first gold medal'."

Japan had a total of 11 medals today (July 31st), while China and the US headed the table with 17.

France currently stands in third position with seven medals, with Team GB so far settling for three in 20th position.

Posted by Susan Ballion