Kelly Deguchi earns career-best result with seventh place at World Champs
Montréal, June 14, 2025 – Canadian Kelly Deguchi’s run at the Senior World Championships in Budapest, Hungary, came to a halt in the repechage on Saturday, where she finished seventh in the Under 52 kg category. Early on she won two bouts, but those were followed by losses to the eventual gold and bronze medallists in her category.
Photo: IJF / Emanuele Di Feliciantonio
Kelly Deguchi
This was Deguchi’s fourth appearance at the Senior Worlds, and only her second competition since the Paris Olympics. She began the tournament by winning her first duel of the day by waza-ari against Israel’s Gefen Primo, currently ranked 7th in the world.
“A very big win,” noted her coach Antoine Valois-Fortier.
The 26-year-old then got the better of Peru’s Driulys Rivas, holding her down on not one, but two occasions for the win.
Deguci continued with winning ways up until the quarter-finals, where she took to the tatami against Japan’s Uta Abe – a multiple world champion. The two judokas were very dynamic right from the start of their confrontation. Yet in the end, it was the Japanese athlete who came out on top via ippon, sending Deguchi through to the repechage. Uta Abe would go on to take the gold medal in the final against Distria Krasniqi (Kosovo).
“Uta Abe is probably one of the greatest judokas of our generation. She doesn’t lose very often at all, so that level of athlete was a very big challenge to face,” shared Valois-Fortier, proud of what Deguci accomplished today.
In her third bout, Kelly Deguchi faced Hungary’s Roza Gyertyas, who is currently ranked 14th internationally. With just over a minute to go, the crowd favourite scored a waza-ari and took the lead. Despite numerous attacks from the Canadian, Gyertyas managed to protect that lead until the very end of the bout, and was rewarded with a bronze medal at the end of the day.
“It was a close duel that came down to a tiny mistake – and that’s what top-tier judo is really all about! After the waza-ari was scored, it was a bit of a race to get back on the scoreboard, but Kelly ran out of time at the end. All in all, it was a very good day for her though, the best result of her career.”
Inaugural World Championships for Beaton
In the same weight category, Evelyn Beaton took part in her inaugural Senior World Championships on Saturday.
The 20-year-old Canuck judoka defeated Serbia’s Nikolina Nisavic with an ippon in overtime, before losing to Hungary’s Reka Pupp (10th internationally), in another bout that went overtime.
“She’d never managed to beat Nikolina Nisavic in the past, so it’s always great to see that kind of progress! Being here at her first senior world championships will serve her well in the future. Of course there’s a few things here and there she needs to fine-tune, but her judo, especially standing, is clearly up to scratch,” shared Antoine Valois-Fortier.
Beaton will now set her sights on the Pan-American Open in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, at the end of June.
The next judokas to step onto the tatami wearing the red maple leaf at the Budapest Senior World Championships will be Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard (-63kg) and François Gauthier-Drapeau (-81kg), who will both be in action on Monday. Stayed tuned for more judo excitement and excellence!
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Written by Sportcom for Judo Canada
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Patrick Esparbès
Chief Operating Officer
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p.esparbes@judocanada.org