South Korean An Ba-Ul claimed his first world title and Japan's Misato Nakamura her third on the second day of the judo world championships in Astana on Tuesday. The 21-year-old An, a gold medal winner at junior level in 2013, came out on top in the men's 66kg with a golden score defeat of Russian Mikhail Pulyaev in the final. Golan Pollack of Israel and Uzbek Rishod Sobirov took bronze.
This was Pulyaev's second successive silver medal at this level after his loss in the 2014 final to Masashi Ebinuma of Japan in Chelyabinsk. An, appearing at his first world championships, was winning South Korea's first gold of the 2015 championships after a couple of near misses on the opening day. In the day's other final, Nakamura exploited the absence of Kosovo's Majlinda Kelmendi, the injured queen in the women's 52kg division, to annex a third world title after 2009 and 2011. The Tokyo-born judoka saw off Andreea Chitu of Romania with a penalty win to add this to her previous world 52kg titles in 2009 and 2011.