Spanish exponent lands karate’s historic first Olympic gold karate
SPAIN’S Sandra Sanchez Jaime won the first ever Olympic Games karate gold medal in Tokyo on Thursday.
She ensured her name would be in the sport’s history books by beating Japan’s Kiyou Shimizu in the women’s kata final. Karate was included for the first time on the Olympic programme for the pandemic-delayed 2020 Games, but was not included on the menu for Paris 2024.
Sanchez Jaime, 39, took the historic title with a higher athletic score than the home favourite Shimizu a er the two karatekas were all square on 19.60 on the technical score.
The 2018 world champion beamed and raised her arms skywards a er the chief judge had walked out to stand between the two finalists, then raising the right arm to signify victory for Sanchez Jaime.
Karate is split into two disciplines: kata, where athletes perform choreographed moves for the judges to score, and kumite, which involves two fighters trying to land blows on each other in bouts of up to three minutes.
The karate competition is being held at the Nippon Budokan.
It staged judo at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and two years later was where The Beatles played on their tour of Japan.