US Open

At US Open I had a bye first round and fought the winner of an Argentinean and an American. US Open was run pretty badly compared to the world cup but in the end the comp went from 9am to about 8pm. This is due to the fact that they ran a repechage instead of a knockout like they would at a world cup or grand slam.
I fought an Argentinean called Perault who I think I have seen before. I watched his first fight and due to his posture I knew he liked doing drop seoi nage and sit back on his heels a lot.
In the first exchange we fought for grips with me settling with a top grip and I think he had an inside lapel. We both settled and didn’t do too much and the referee said matte (stop.) Just after he said matte my opponent entered with a ko ouchi and thewy me for a yuko maybe waza ari and the ref scored a waza ari...even though he said matte. But because it was so close I guess he could have it but anyway I came back strong and threw him backwards for a yuko.

We kept fighting busting grips and engaging on the ground when he threw me near the edge with an ouchi gari. I landed fully on my side facing the floor with my face and the ref called Ippon. I couldn’t believe it because when you get thrown for ippon you know because you are looking at the roof. But I was looking at the floor. He ended up rescoring it to a waza ari and so I lost anyway because my opponent then had 2 waza aris. I have watched the video a few times and still think it was a yuko. I couldn’t believe it I comer all this way to get thrown for 2 dodgy scores. I’m not one to ever blame refs but this time I was just really disappointed.

But in the end I shouldn’t be letting my opponents throw me for anything whether it be yukos or ippons. They shouldn’t be throwing me at all.

So that was my day done. I watched the rest of my team mates before Nicola, Sara, Mark and I went to maccas (even though Americans don’t call it Maccas) and we loaded up. I ordered a double quarter pounder meal supersized. It was awesome because you can’t get supersized at home. I ate it all and felt pretty sick afterwards but it was awesome.

We left at an early 4am from our hotel and flew here to Japan. My fellow Aussies and I are staying and training at Tsukuba University where I spent 4 weeks here only 1 month ago.
Today we are all feeling jet lagged and did an hour of our own training and adjusting to the super hot weather.

The world championships start on Tuesday with me fighting on Sunday. I am looking forward to fighting as I am so keen to win fights and fight against the best. It is so disappointing to train in Japan for so long, come back and place 2nd in oju, I won nsw international open and lost first round in both comps in the US.
Talk soon