phelps

basically I agree on everything... I'd be happy also with just 3+1 minute as the Kumite bouts time limits (4+1 would be better, but still)... and the best competition format to me is the one used in wrestling until last year (I don't like the idea of a competition over more than 1 day)...preliminaries and repechage in the early session and finals in the late session... moreover, having 12 individual events (10 kumite + 2 kata) in the schedule, I'd like to see 3 events per day over 4 days (1 kata and 2 kumite classes in the first 2 days and 3 kumite weights in the last 2 days, with the heavyweights always as the final class, of course)...

that was the past... in the last couple of years all the main events have JPN then ESP and then ITA as an established ranking (since Karate became more widely spread around the world, France are losing day after day their superiority, especially in Kata)...

meanwhile the women's semis weren't so close (neither of the 2)... and once again the Gold Medal match will feature the well expected and kata not only is boring by itself...it's also always the same story in terms of results...

and, as expected, men's team kata Gold Medal match will be between and (but Spain almost lost vs , they only got a slim 3-2 score in their favor)...

men's team kata, semifinals: vs and vs women's team kata, semifinals: vs / and vs I bet on a double ESP vs JPN clash for Gold...as if nobody saw that coming...

wow! we won against the mighty Koreans... with a team made only with Alps League players (except for Trivellato and Pavlu, who play in the DEL, the first one, and in the DEL2, the second one)...

I knew I was going to miss something...I give up...it's too complicated... p.s. fixed...

I think the video replays are shown also on the screens beside the mat, but I'm not sure they have one for each of the 5 mat during the preliminaries... for sure during the medal rounds all the pictures will be shown on the giant screen hanging from the roof and made available to all the people on the stands... p.s. however, I think coaches shouldn't interfere with the video judges...so, I guess this idea of the video room not close to the mat is quite good (of course, being the first time they use it, it needs to be improved...but I think it's the right direction...

Day #2 recap... Men's Individual Kumite, -60kg Gold Medal Match: Naoto Sago vs Angelo Crescenzo Bronze Medal Match #1: Darkhan Assadilov vs Kalvins Kalnins Bronze Medal Match #2: Abdessalam Ameknassi vs Jovanni Martinez Women's Individual Kumite, -50kg Gold Medal Match: Miho Miyahara vs Serap Ozcelik Arapoglu Bronze Medal Match #1: Bettina Plank vs Jelena Pehar Bronze Medal Match #2: Tatiana Rybalchenko vs Sara Bahmanyar Men's Individual Kumite, -67kg Gold Medal Match: Vinicius Figueira vs Steven Dacosta Bronze Medal Match #1: Camilo Velozo vs Abdel Rahman Almasatfa Bronze Medal Match #2: Hamoon Derafshipour vs Raul Cuerva Mora Women's Individual Kumite, -55kg Gold Medal Match: Jana Bitsch vs Dorota Banaszczyk Bronze Medal Match #1: Valeriia Alekhina vs Wen Tzu-Yun Bronze Medal Match #2: Sara Yamada vs Ivet Goranova Men's Individual Kumite, -75kg Gold Medal Match: Bahman Asgari vs Luigi Busà Bronze Medal Match #1: Beslan Mizov vs Ken Nishimura Bronze Medal Match #2: Rafael Aghayev vs Dastonbek Otabolaev Women's Individual Kumite, -61kg Gold Medal Match: Yin Xiaoyan vs Jovana Prekovic Bronze Medal Match #1: Laura Pasqua vs Btissam Sadini Bronze Medal Match #2: Merve Coban vs Giana Lofty

actually there is video review... you don't see the video crew at the judges table because now they are in a separate room (upstairs, in one of the big suites of the Madrid Arena), where they can watch all the videos on multiple synchronized giant screens and let the ref know what's their decision via radio communication...

Mehdizadeh lost 9-4 to the Moroccan guy! that's a huge upset...

yeah, they did nothing for the whole match...but I don't like Saymatov's style at all, so I always pick his opponent in cases like this... about the rules...I don't really know how they got worse in these years instead of improving...I don't think 3 mins of regulation + 1 of OT could compromise the fughters' health...they can surely have (both, men and women) this kind of bouts...

and Saymatov (UZB) survives at the Hantei vs the Egyptian guy...not so deserved win, imho...

Chile!!! they had 1 guy already in the semifinals, now they have another one in the pool final...very good and unexpected team result from them...

in the meantime, in the men's -60kg Mehdizadeh (IRI) won against the K1PL grand winner Samdan (TUR) and Naoto Sago (JPN) just destroyed 6-1 the Asian games champion, Arrosyiid (INA)...people can't always play at home...

yeah...and Germany has 2 fighters in the Kumite finals...meh...

man, this is just unbelievable...the Polish girl in the -55kg won her semifinal against Yamada (JPN) at the Hantei (judges' decision)... I'd have never thought something like this could happen... better for Italy... however, it was 2 minutes of nothing...I don't really know how could Cardin lose against this girl (with all respect for her)...

yess...Crescenzo (men's -60kg) won against the always dangerous Firzaliyev of AZE and now he's in the pool semifinals... meanwhile the bout of this class between Medhizadeh (IRI) and Samdan (TUR) started...unfortunately it doesn't have any tv coverage...

to be noticed how Russia were almost not existing in Karate until it didn't become an Olympic Sport... now they're improving fast and furious and they're altready getting better results than ever before...

Jana Bitsch vs Valeriia Alekhina and Sara Yamada vs Dorota Banaszczyk are the women's -55kg semifinals... we need a miracle from the Polish girl, but frankly I'm hopeless...

oh, boy...this is painful (and shameful)...Sara Cardin (women's -55kg) lost the pool final against an unknow Polish girl... so, probably she won't even make the repechage bracket...

well, if you look at Yin's route to the final, you could even be a little optimistic... the repechage bracket on her side is LAT vs POL, the winner vs MAR, then comes Alipour...and if she wins her repechage bout, then she's in the Bronze Medal match vs Pasqua (ITA), who's at her 1st international medal round since 2015 Serie A meet in Salzburg (and she only won a world bronze in 2014, then nothing anymore)... by the way, today's we're having a lot of surprises...much more than yesterday...

it looks that today we're going better than yesterday...and finally some Kumite medals (or at least some chances for those) would eventually come... Busà is always our superstar (he won his 1st world title in 2006 and still managed to make the final 12 years after, with many other medals -in total, 2 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze at the world champs and 3-2-5 at the Europeans...counting only the individual stuff- in between these 2, of course), but if the live blog is not wrong -anything else has stopped working here...but I think it's more about my internet broadband connection that's not performing as it's supposed to do- also Laura Pasqua has surprisingly won her pool and has reached the semifinals...

maybe the Olympic Channel?

interesting to know that they started women's program... maybe one day they will be as good as the men are nowadays..