Hidehiko Yoshida’s long wait for a World title

Hidehiko Yoshida peaked really early. His first international competition was the 1991 World Championships where he got bronze. Because he was not ranked at the time, he had no bye and had to fight an unusually high number of matches – seven in all. He had lost to Anthonie Wurth (NED) in the quarterfinal but made his way back through the repechage and defeated Kerrith Brown (GBR) to salvage a bronze medal.

Yoshida’s next one was the big one: the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. He was still largely an unknown quantity at the start of the competition but by the end of the day, a star was born. He threw Jason Morris (USA) with one of the most technically beautiful uchimata ever seen.

At the 1993 Hamilton World Championships, Yoshida was the natural favorite to win gold. In the final, he faced a relative unknown from South Korea named Jeon Ki-young. It was Jeon’s second international tournament, so he was very green relative to Yoshida. But something had happened to Yoshida’s back during one of the earlier matches. He had injured it somehow.

Yoshida put on a brave faced and at the start of his match against Jeon, it was he who was the aggressor. But as the match wore on, it was obvious that his back was impairing his ability to fight. He started getting penalties and eventually was thrown by Jeon. It was an upset because Jeon was really a newbie in international judo at the time. But the fact that Yoshida was impaired did leave many to speculate what might have happened if Yoshida had not been injured.

In those days, the World Championships was not held annually but every two years. So, Yoshida had to wait until another two years to get another shot at the World’s. The 1995 World Championships was in Japan and everyone was looking forward to a rematch between Yoshida and Jeon. And it did happen. They met in the final.

With home ground advantage and no injuries to hamper him, Yoshida came out with guns blazing. Once again, he was the aggressor with Jeon being largely on the defensive. He knocked Jeon down a few times with kouchi-gari but not enough to score. Still, he looked to be on the way to finally winning his World title. Jeon ruined his plans by suddenly pulling off a superb drop sode into osoto-gari combination that landed Yoshida flat on his back. No gold for Yoshida, again.

The next World’s was in 1997 but Yoshida had to give that one a miss due to injuries he had sustained in the previous year’s Olympics. At the 1996 Atlanta Games, a complacent Yoshida got thrown in the first round by Adrian Croitoru of Romania, who caught him with tani-otoshi for ippon. He fought he way through the repechage but in his bronze medal match, Marko Spittka of Germany broke Yoshida’s arm with a standing armlock (which was legal back then).

Not being able to compete at the 1997 World’s meant he would have to wait until 1999 before he could try for a World gold again. At the 1999 Birmingham World Championships, Yoshida was considered past his prime already. But after winning the Olympic gold seven years prior, he was determined to finally get a World title as well. He blitzed his way through the rounds and in the final, threw Victor Florescu of Moldovia with his trademark uchimata for ippon. And with that, Yoshida finally got what had eluded him for seven long years.

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