MADRID, 8 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Spanish judoka Nikoloz Sherazadishvili, who after the Tokyo Olympics went from competing in the -90 kilos category to doing so in -100, explained that the “decision has come with age” and that it was necessary “to continue being the best “, because he believes that he is going to “get better results” and, although they are “different challenges”, he presents himself to the 2022 World Cup thinking of “being champion”.
“That decision has come with age and weight loss, to continue being the best he had to pass this point, perhaps in this time of change of category he needs an adaptation, but we believe that we are going to get better results than even in -90 kilos”, the two-time world champion explained to Europa Press after his presentation as a member of the Toyota Team for the next Olympic cycle.
‘Shera’ acknowledges that he and his team were “pretty clear” that going up to -100 kilos “after the Games”. “Even before they changed the date for another year in 2020 for the Olympic Games, we were already thinking about changing to 2020. They extended us a year, we had to have stayed to continue in the Games and we couldn’t not stand it. Now that have finished and for the next cycle, which are the ones in Paris, we have decided to go -100 and we hope that we will get better results”, he declared.
The reasons for leaving a category in which he was world champion are “not to suffer so much with the weight” when preparing for a competition and the grounds that he has been acquiring so far and that encourage him to go one step further in his career. . “Not knowing how your body is going to wake up with so much downhill, so much suffering, that is the benefit I can have, and the experience that the Tokyo Olympics have given me in the face of Paris,” he assured.
In Tokyo 2020, the Spanish judoka was eliminated in the quarterfinals and was subsequently unable to overcome the playoffs, remaining without a medal despite participating as number one in the world ranking of his category, an experience from which he says he has learned.
Now, not many differences are expected in a new category to which it already seems “adapted”. “For me it’s going to be similar. I’ve won two medals in the last two competitions, so I’m really looking forward to it, I’m thinking more about the World Championship than the category itself”, he commented.
“In the end, the difference is that I enjoy myself, I enjoy what I do and I keep going. I don’t see any other way than this, I do what I like the most and the next thing is to enjoy and continue competing and get the best results I can,” he said.
“MY GOAL IN THE WORLD CUP IS TO BE CHAMPION”
Next October Sherazadishvili will play the World Cup in Uzbekistan, the first since this new change in category, in which he always aspires to achieve the maximum. There, he does not sign any result other than victory. “The truth is that I would like it to be a medal, but a gold medal, I can’t think of any other way. I can later be happy with a medal, it’s a World Cup, but my goal is to be champion”, he declared.
In this new category “all the rivals change completely” for the judoka and that is why he must “study them all”, although he already knew many of them from his previous category. But in addition to the study outside the tatami, the two-time world champion considers that in order to know how to defeat a rival, you have to have fought against him. “The idea is to get hold of them, apart from just seeing them, you have to feel, and you have to do with them and fight with them in order to know how to win,” he warned.
“They are different challenges, they are different people and that is where you are improving your judo, where you are going to have to improve, change things and this never stops evolving”, concluded ‘Shera’, who is clear that “you always have to improve at a mental level, at a judo level, at a technical, tactical, physical, nutrition level”, in addition to the “extra” of having to measure yourself against new opponents and having to reinvent yourself at this point in your career.