Shropshire Star

Gemma Howell sets the gold standard once more

Judo star Gemma Howell continued her hot streak as she took gold at the Zagreb Grand Prix in Croatia.

Published

The success in the -70kg class comes after Howell, from Telford, bagged another gold at the Budapest Grand Prix in Hungary earlier this month.

She defeated Emilie Sook (Denmark), Anka Pogacnik (Slovenia) and Daria Pogorzelec (Poland) to win Pool C and set up a semi-final contest against Sanne Van Dijke (Netherlands). An ippon was enough to defeat Van Dijke and progress to the final to face Kim Polling (Netherlands). In the final, Howell scored a waza-ari in the dying seconds to take gold.

Danny Williams, from Shrewsbury, defeated Keisei Nakano (Philippines) and Erkhembayar Battogtokh (Mongolia) in the -73kg before losing to world No.9 Arthur Margelidon (Canada) in the third round.

Sarah Adlington, also from Shrewsbury, and Powys’ Natalie Powell suffered second round losses in +78kg and -78kg respectively.