Clearly the guy has won a ton of medals, but I didn't start actively paying attention to international judo competition until the last 1-2 years.
Anyway, anything interesting about him you'd happen to want to share? I really like the vids I've seen of him so far.
For a big man he was a complete fighter. Always a formindable opponent. He could throw with uchimata or drop down for tomenage. Most of his mat work were pins (kesa/ushiro kesa gatame) or armbars. Within the top 5 at the world class level. Of all the big Russians I think he had the best overall fighting skills.
Informative post as always. Thanks, JBB. When I think about Russian judo now, he's one of the first that comes to mind.
he has great judo. fought for ippon. very nice transition into osaekomi and jujigate.
how good was he? tops in the world good.
Cool, thanks Josh. I'm interested to watch some more footage of him. I can't imagine trying to escape one of his pins. Like fighting off a grizzly bear.
He was super efficient with gripping, and ashiwaza, especially against big men. It seemed like to beat him, you had to have something "super" because he was so well rounded. Either crazy power, or crazy leverage, or some super-duper move was the only way to beat him.
Good stuff, LeroyJ. Thanks.
I watched this highlight and followed the comment that says to watch at 2:35. Looks like the Chinese version of Choi Hong-man, and Tmenov got the W.
I remember seeing him pull off an amazing uchimata to jujigatame when the guy blocked and they hit the ground.
he honestly should've been world champ several times.
Well I'll be damned, I forgot to put the link in for the HL I mentioned:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTgu5iKeu7E
He was so close to winning the worlds/olympics so many times...he even seemed to lose track of the score and allow himself to be penalized (for a second time if memory serves) against his Japanese counterpart back in 2003 at the worlds (was it against Muneta?)...
the best.