At the World Championship, which took place from November 10 to 12 in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, the Croatian sambo team returned with two medals. Of the ten Croatian competitors, the most successful were Lea Gobec and Tin Straža, and both performed in sports sambo.
On the second day of the competition, in the category up to 88 kilograms, Tin Straža won the bronze medal. In the first fight, he defeated the representative of Ukraine with a score of 6:0. Then, in the second round, he lost to the later finalist, the representative of Kazakhstan, with a score of 5:0. In the rematch, he defeated the representative of Romania with a score of 2:0 and finally won 3rd place by defeating the representative of Iran with a score of 5:0.
For 22-year-old Tin, this is his first appearance at the world championship and his first medal from a major competition. It is also the first historical men’s medal for Croatian sambo at the world championships.
On the last day of the competition, Lea Gobec won the silver medal in the category up to 80 kilograms. In the first fight, she defeated last year’s world champion, the representative of Russia, with a score of 2:0. Then, in the semi-finals, she was better than the representative of Mongolia with a score of 1:0, thus winning her first final at the world championships. In the final itself, she lost to the representative of Romania.
This is not Lea’s first medal from major competitions, she already has two silvers from the European championships and a bronze from last year’s world championship in her collection, but it is certainly her biggest success so far.
