Pan-American Open Montevideo, Uruguay 2013

Some observation on this event.

There are only three women in the plus 78KG, one in 78KG and nine in the 70KG. Please note that Kayla Harrison moved down from 78KG to 70KG. Of the nine women the 70KG, three are from the US (S. Bleier, K. Harrison and Katie Sells).

Men competitors – 112
Women competitors – 63
Total – 175

Counties participating:

Argentina (ARG)
Brazil (BRA)
Canada (CAN)
Chile (CHI)
China (CHN)
Colombia (COL)
Dominican Republic (DOM)
Great Britain (GBR)
Hungary (HUN)
Ireland (IRL)
Japan (JPN)
Mexico (MEX)
Portugal (POR)
Puerto Rico (PUR)
United States of America (USA)
Uruguay (URU)

Notice that Cuba is not participating.

For more info, please visit www.ippon.org.

Kayla Harrison placed second in the 70KG division.

Travis Stevens place first in the 81KG division.

Bleier moved up to 78 and took gold. She was down by wazari, threw for a yuko, and then pinned for the ippon.

How much weight did Kayla have to cut? Did she come in expecting to play 78 and then go to 70 to find competition? Kinda amazing.

Was great to see so many US team members vying for medals, just wish I could switch mats on ippon.tv so I could have watched mat 1, especially in the bronze medal matches for Katie Sell and Myles Porter.

I was told, over two weeks ago, that Kayla was going to play in the 70KG division.

It is noted that Kayla lost to the 2009 World Champion.

Jerry Hays wrote:I was told, over two weeks ago, that Kayla was going to play in the 70KG division.

It is noted that Kayla lost to the 2009 World Champion.

The 2009 world champion who only had 1 match before the gold medal round. Kayla didn't even get a bye for the first round.

And boy, that ref was cracked when he awarded ippon for crashing through the barrier. Glad he waived it off before awarding the round. Kayla was playing really well.

Thanks, Stacey for the update. I was at a shiai, 120 miles from home, today, so I missed all of the matches.

Jerry Hays wrote:Thanks, Stacey for the update. I was at a shiai, 120 miles from home, today, so I missed all of the matches.

should have told me, and I would have put in a spoiler warning

Stacey wrote:

Jerry Hays wrote:I was told, over two weeks ago, that Kayla was going to play in the 70KG division.

It is noted that Kayla lost to the 2009 World Champion.

The 2009 world champion who only had 1 match before the gold medal round. Kayla didn't even get a bye for the first round.

And boy, that ref was cracked when he awarded ippon for crashing through the barrier. Glad he waived it off before awarding the round. Kayla was playing really well.

Reason Alvear went straight into semi finals and Harrison did not, is that the Colombian was the top seed and Harrison was not seeded at all (due to being new to this category). Along with winning '09 world's, Alvear also won bronze at London Olympics.

JFTW wrote:
Reason Alvear went straight into semi finals and Harrison did not, is that the Colombian was the top seed and Harrison was not seeded at all (due to being new to this category). Along with winning '09 world's, Alvear also won bronze at London Olympics.

Thanks. Figured Kayla didn't get a bye in the first round because of the new category. Just seemed odd to me that Alvear got a double bye, all the way into the semis, everybody else had to fight at least once to get to the semis, except Kayla, who had to fight twice to get to the semis. Alvear was smooth and quick - would have liked to see her fight more.