In the last Newsletter, I advised that although Nathan and Josh “fought for a medal in the Asia-Oceania Continental Championships and also fought at probably their highest level at the Senior World Championships winning one match each and having very close matches with much higher ranked opponents in their next round, their Olympic Qualification points were just below what was required to make the cut-off for their respective divisions.”
- They spent their third two-week quarantine period this year contemplating their future starting with a well-earned rest and rehabilitation of various body parts which had been band-aided through their training and competition cycles. With significant improvements in their competition performance through this Olympic cycle, planning for 2022 Commonwealth Games and 2024 Olympic Games preparations was also discussed.
- A series of unusual events then resulted in the Australian Olympic Quota position for the Judo team being vacated and the IJF subsequently reallocating it to the male with the next highest qualification points which was Nathan. This was completely unexpected and Nathan commenced a serious and rapid ramp up to training at competition tempo over a short period before departing for Tokyo on Sunday night 18th July. Notably, Josh is only 3 points behind him on qualification points in over 1500 points so you can see how close the positions are. Both were deserving of a guernsey but it was a real bonus for Nathan to receive the invitation.
- Many of you have already reached out to Nathan (and also Josh) and I know that they (and Kerrye and I) have appreciated this greatly. I am sure that together with our family you all wish that Nathan and the other 2 Australian Judokas Aoife Coughlan and Katharina Haecker are able to muster their best efforts and deliver great performances on the largest world sporting stage in 5 years, and of course we also wish them and National Coach Daniel Kelly a safe and happy Olympic experience.
Nathan competes this Sunday 25th July at 1100 local (Japan) time (1200 Australian time).Athletes in Nathan’s division can be found at https://judobase.ijf.org/#/competition/profile/2035/competitors/2
- Judo Australia has released some messages including this one:
“Rio Olympians Katharina Haecker - Judo Athlete and Nathan Katz will make their second Olympic appearances, while Aoife Coughlan will make her Olympic debut.
- How to watch ?!
- Nathan (-66kg) competition starts 11am (local time) Sunday 25 July - Nippon Budokan Mat 1- Katharina (-63kg) competition starts 11am (local time) Tuesday 27 July - Nippon Budokan Mat 2- Aoife (-70kg) competition starts 11am (local time) Wednesday 28 July - Nippon Budokan Mat 2
- Official draw will be 2pm local time - Thursday 22nd July
Channel 7 is the official Olympic broadcaster and you can watch live on 7plus, or you can watch at live sites around the country (check for COVID-19 restrictions).
- Further details on our website
- Full competition schedule at https://olympics.com/tokyo-2020/olympic-games/en/results/judo/olympic-schedule-and-results.htm
- See also:
https://www.olympics.com.au/news/tokyo-2020-preview-judo/https://www.facebook.com/judoaus/https://www.olympics.com.au/games/tokyo-2020/team/https://www.olympics.com.au/olympics-live/