The Georgian national judo team gained 1 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze medals at Dusseldorf Grand Prix. Varlam Liparteliani reached the highest step of the podium.
The leader of the world rankings in 90 kg weight category hold 5 meetings on German tatami and won 4 of them. The only meeting, where the Georgian leader needed full wrestling time – 5 minutes was against another representative of Georgian Beka Gviniashvili, whom he overcame by shidos 3:2.
Before the battle with Gviniashvili, Varlam Liparteliani beat American Thomas Kapra, Kazakh Islam Bozbayev and Swedish Markus Niman. In final, he overcame Russian Kazbek Zankishyev in a minute and 37 seconds.
Together with gold medal, the Georgian gained 300 ranking points and strengthened his leadership in 90 kg weight category.
Like Varlam Liparteliani, the current European and World champion Avtandil Chrikishvili (81kg) also wrestled in the first international tournament in the current season, but gained only silver medal and 180 points. The Georgian beat Italian Antonio Chiano, Mongolian Uuganbaatar Otonbaatar, Hungarian Laslo Szoknyai and German Swen Marech. In the decisive meeting, Chrikishvili lost to Belgian Joaquim Botyo.
Nugzar Tatalashvili (73kg) ended the tournament by winning the silver medal, which guarantees him to hit the top ten.
Before the final, Tatalashvili won over Cuban Magdiel Estrada, Belgian Sammy Chouch, Italian Andrea Regis, Viktor Skvortov of UAE and Brazilian Marcello Kontini and lost the chance of gold medal against Japanese Shohei Ono.
Vazha Margvelashvili (66kg) and Beka Gviniashvili (90kg) gained bronze medals. Both of them lost the chance of gold-silver in semifinal.
After the failure against Liparteliani, Beka Gviniashvili beat Serbian Aleksandr Kukolzh by yuko.
Amiran Papinashvili, Lasha Giunashvili (both 60kg), Tornike Tatarashvili (66kg), Lasha Shavdatuashvili (73kg), Aleksandre Zaalishvili (100kg) and Levan Matiashvili (+100kg) also participated on behalf of Georgia.
The team, headed by Irakli Uznadze, occupied the 2nd place among 68 countries with 1 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze medals.
Tbilisi Sports Palace will host the next Grand Prix on March 20-22.
