After some health setbacks, it was Wagner’s first start on this year’s IJF World Tour. In the final, the Olympic bronze medalist defeated Guusje Steenhuis from the Netherlands with a powerful ura-nage in the golden-score overtime after almost ten minutes of fighting. National coach Claudiu Pusa was pleased with the strong performance: “Anna didn’t make any mistakes here today. The World Champion is back!”
In the semi-finals, Anna-Maria Wagner prevailed against teammate Luise Malzahn with a Wazaari rating for Uchi-mata. In the preliminary round, the Württemberger could defeat Patricija Brolih from Slovenia and Audrey Tcheumeo from France.
After the final fight, she took stock of the day: “The last few weeks have been a rollercoaster of emotions. My clear goal for Antalya was Mission Gold. I’m incredibly proud of myself to be back at the right time. My goal is to fight for gold again at the World Championships in October.”
Four other German athletes were fighting for the medals in Antalya, but ultimately had to settle for fifth place: Miriam Butkereit from TSV Glinde (up to 70 kg), Luise Malzahn, Renée Lucht from HT 16 Hamburg (over 78 kg) and Dominic Ressel from TSV Kronshagen (up to 81 kg).
In the medal table, Georgia took first place with two gold and two silver medals, followed by France (2/1/4) and Brazil (1/1/3. A total of 213 women and 312 men from 63 nations took part. The competitions in Turkey served as a test for the European Championships in Sofia (April 29 to May 1, 2022).
