Seven years after becoming a world champion, Lucie Decosse is finally an Olympic gold medalist.
The French judoka, who won her first world championship at 63 kilograms in 2005 and won a silver medal in that weight class in Beijing four years ago, defeated upstart Kerstin Thiele on Wednesday at the ExCeL Centre in London to win the gold medal in the 70-kg weight class at the 2012 Summer Olympics.
Decosse, the pre-Olympic favorite according to Sports Illustrated, scored a waza ari (10 points in competition scoring) off of an o uchi gari (inside trip) takedown, and added another point to her score when she put Thiele on her back. She added one more point on a yuko, while her upstart opponent, who was not picked to win a medal by SI, was unable to mount any offense against the popular Decosse.
In the men's 90-kg, Song Dae-Nam of South Korea completed an improbable Olympic run when he defeated Asley Gonzalez of Cuba to win the gold medal. The two judoka ran battled through the five minutes of regulation, with neither man gaining an advantage and each being assessed a warning for stalling. Finally, in the "golden score" portion of the contest, Song pulled off an o uchi gari, scoring a waza ari and completing the victory.
