Tokyo Olympics 2020 Men’s Wrestling Greco-Roman 130kg: Mijain Lopez of Cuba wins Gold

Tokyo Olympics 2020 Men’s Wrestling Greco-Roman 130kg: Mijain Lopez of Cuba wins Gold

Mijain Lopez

Mijain Lopez of Cuba did his home country proud at the Men’s Wrestling Greco-Roman 130kg category. The events took place on the 1st and 2nd of August at the Makuhari Messe in Mihama-Ku. A total of 16 competitors from 16 nations took part in the event. A total of 4 medals were handed out (1 Gold, 1 Silver, 2 Bronze).

Lopez beat Iakob Kajaia of Georgia to win the Gold medal for the fourth straight time, becoming the first man in history to do so. The Cuban first won Gold at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and followed it up in the 2012 Olympics as well – both in the 120kg category. He then took part in the 130kg category to win the Gold at the 2016 Rio Olympics, and more recently the Tokyo Olympics.

Mijain Lopez blanked his opponents to victory!

Mijain Lopez
Mijain Lopez

Lopez, the favourite, coasted past his opponents to win the Gold medal. He took on Alin Alexuc-Ciurariu of Romania in the Round of 16 and blanked him 9-0. Next was Amin Mirzazadeh of Iran, Lopez once again had an easy outing, this time scoring 8 as opposed to Mirzazadeh’s 0. Lopez beat Riza Kayaalp of Turkey 2-0 to advance to the finals, and eventually beat Iakon Kajaia 5-0 to win the Gold medal.

Iakob Kajaia
Iakob Kajaia

Kajaia who won the silver medal found the going easy as well. He beat Elias Kuosmanen of Finland, 9-0 in the Round of 16, before having a tough encounter against Sergey Semenov in the quarter finals. He won 3-1. The semi-final was closer than ever. It was against Yasmani Acosta. But he still made it to the finals.

Riza Kayaalp and Sergei Semenov win Bronze

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jo8TfDApPQ

The Bronze was won by Riza Kayaalp of Turkey and Sergey Semenov of Russia. Kayaalp beat Mantas Knystautas 5-1 in the Round of 16, and went on to beat Eduard Popp of Germany in the quarterfinals before falling at the hands of the indomitable Mijain Lopez. He then took on Amir Mirzazadeh in the bronze medal match via. the repechage and decimated him scoring 7-2.

The other bronze medal went to Semenov of Russia. He beat Abdellatif Mohamed of Egypt in the Round of 16 before losing a close battle with silver medalist Iakob Kajaia. He then entered the repechage and Elias Kuosmanen and semi-finalist Yasmani Acosta of Chile to win the Bronze medal.

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