ASTANA – Kazakhstan’s national judo team secured its first-ever gold medal in the mixed team event at the World Judo Championships among cadets in Guayaquil, Ecuador, marking a historic achievement for the country’s judo programme. Kazakhstan’s national judo team secured its first-ever gold medal in the mixed team event at the World Judo Championships among cadets in Guayaquil, Ecuador.
Photo credit: Ministry of Tourism and Sports. The team title capped a record-breaking individual campaign, with Kazakh judokas winning 11 medals – four gold, three silver and four bronze – at the championships. The result was described as the best in the history of Kazakhstan’s judo at the youth world level, reported the Ministry of Tourism and Sports’ press service on Aug.
24. Kazakhstan’s boys finished first in the team standings, while the girls placed second. Fatima Supygalieva also made history as the first Kazakh female cadet to win a world championship title. The results come as part of broader changes to Kazakhstan’s national sports training system led by the Ministry of Tourism and Sports in cooperation with the Judo Federation of Kazakhstan and Zhenis (Victory) club.
Following the Paris Olympics, the federation began updating its approach to the preparation of national teams, with Kazakh coaches working closely with leading international specialists, including Ezio Gamba’s team. Cadet, junior and senior national teams are being integrated into a unified training system.
“We are building a single pathway: cadets – juniors – national team – Olympic Games. When an athlete moves from one age category to another, they should not have to start their preparation from scratch. They continue working within a unified model, with common requirements, scientific support and a clear development trajectory,” Minister of Tourism and Sports Yerbol Myrzabosynov said.
He described the team gold and record medal haul as concrete evidence that the new system is producing results. “The team gold and record ten medals in the individual competitions are concrete confirmation that the new system works. Our task now is to consistently scale this experience to other sports,” he said.
The unified training model includes scientific analysis of the training process, functional diagnostics, individualized workloads, sports medicine, recovery programmes and continuous monitoring of each athlete’s progress. The National Sports University is expected to play an important role by providing national teams with scientific and analytical support.
Similar approaches are being introduced in fencing, boxing, wrestling and other sports, with the involvement of leading Kazakh and international specialists. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev congratulated the Kazakh judo team on its performance in Guayaquil, praising its victory in the mixed team competition and congratulating Gabit Rasulhan, Supygalieva and Adilzhan Zhaudinov on their individual gold medals.