Canada’s Christa Deguchi beat Huh Mimi of South Korea in the women’s under-57 kg judo final on Monday, garnering Canada’s first Olympic gold medal in the sport, as well as our first gold medal of the Paris 2024 Olympics.
History made. Christa Deguchi just won Canada’s first ever gold medal in Judo. Making 🇨🇦 proud.#Judo #Paris2024
pic.twitter.com/avefZLbYFt— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) July 29, 2024
According to the Canadian Olympic Committee website, the match was scoreless through the four minutes of regulation, so it went into sudden death overtime. At the two-minute mark, Deguchi took a second “shido” (or penalty), equalling the two that Huh had (meaning if either athlete took another penalty, then the other would win the gold). Shortly after, Huh took her third shido for a false attack, rendering Deguchi the Olympic champion.
Deguchi—who ironically lost to Huh in the under-57 kg final at the 2024 world championships— now has four career world championship medals.
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Deguchi advanced to the finals only after defeating France’s Sarah Leonie Cysique in the semifinals. That match also went overtime after neither athlete scored in the four minutes of regulation. Cysique eventually took her third shido of the match, which rendered Deguchi the winner.
With Deguchi’s win, Canada ranks 10th in terms of medal count at the 2024 Olympics (as of publication: 1 gold, 1 silver, 2 bronze). Her Team Canada bio notes that she was born and raised in Japan but moved to compete for Canada (her father’s birth country) in 2017. She started practicing judo when she was just three years old and started competing in her first year of elementary school.
“Heading into her Olympic debut at Paris 2024, Deguchi is the world number one in the women’s 57kg world rankings. She has 11 career Grand Slam gold medals, to go with four silver and two bronze on the elite circuit,” the 28-year-old’s bio states. “From 2023 to 2024, she was a top two finisher in nine of her 10 Grand Slam events and won bronze in the other. In 2022 she won 57kg gold at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England.”
Her younger sister Kelly is also a Team Canada judoka at this year’s Olympics in the 52kg category, but she lost her match in the first round on Sunday morning.
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