World/Open European Sambo Championships for Cadets, Riga, Latvia

John Jayne represented USA Sambo in the World/Open European Cadet Championships on Riga, Latvia, on 13/16 September in the over 84 kg weight class.

There were four countries from outside of Europe that sent teams: South Korea, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan and the United States. The competiton was also called the World Cadet Sambo Championships. Over the two days there were only two finalists from outside of Europe, a Mongolian girl won gold on day 1 and John won Gold for the USA on day 2 in what they called "the most prestigious weight category of the competition".

John was one of the lightest at 91 kg in his weight class. His first opponent from Latvia weighed 130 kg. Both the Russian and Georgian weighed in at over 120 kg. The Bulgarian that John had in the final, who won the Bulgarian National Cadet Judo Championship this year at +90 kg (John won the -90 kg in that competition), weighed in at 105 kg.

The Bulgarian beat the first seeded Russian and the Ukrainian, who was last year's -90 Ukrainian National Cadet Judo Champion, beat the second seeded Georgian, who is ranked 5th in the EJU Cadet Judo Ranking list among boys born in 1997 or later at +90. John is ranked 1st in Europe at -90 kg for that age group in that ranking list. The Georgian beat the Belarusian, who was the Belarus Cadet National Judo Champion last year at -90. John beat the Ukrainian 14-0. John was never in danger of losing all day and only gave up one point all day. That was a penalty for bending the Latvian boy’s wrist forward while applying an armlock.

See the Highlight Video (John appears from 17.18 to 17.50) here



See John’s first fight from 0:45:53 till 0:51:50 and second fight from 1.52 to the end here
 


John appears a bit at the beginning and his final fight is towards the end, from 1:36:26 till 1:44:20, here