This year started really well and the run into the big Paris tournament was good.  We had a couple of good training camps and things had been going well at the beginning of the year.  My wrist and my knee – where I’d had injuries – were both good and I scored on a couple of things in Paris that I’d been working on over the past few months. Lots of little things that mean like I feel like I’m going in the right direction.

Paris is the biggest tournament that we fight in. There’s a crowd of 20,000 people in the Bercy Stadium, which is amazing. We get crowds of four sometimes at international tournaments so Paris is a massive event, it’s very prestigious and it’s nice to win medals there.

This year is the first time I’ve been past the second round in Paris. It’s always been a bogey tournament so for me to not fight particularly well and still get a bronze medal there was a big thing.

The only match I lost was one that I knew I could have won, against Frenchman Alain Schmitt. But you have to expect that when you’re fighting the French in Paris. With that kind of crowd it makes a big difference to the refereeing as well. Scores that might be borderline are always going to go to the French so it’s easier to come to terms with not winning.

Because Paris is quite an easy tournament to get to and because it’s a great tournament to go and watch, my mum and dad always come over. It’s a great atmosphere in the stadium and the best judo players in the world are all there. Previously I’ve never made it past the second round so it was nice to have them at the tournament for the whole day and to give them something to watch. They enjoyed it so for me that was quite nice.

Grinding out victories isn’t what you want to do, it’s not the most spectacular thing, but if you don’t fight well and still win medals at the biggest tournaments then when you’re really on form that should be a good sign. But there are never any guarantees in judo and I went out in my first fight in Hamburg a fortnight later.

I always try and look at the positives, although when you only have one match there aren’t that many positives. Antonio Ciano is a really strong gripper and in training camps I’ve always been a bit worried about getting drawn against him because he fights a similar style of fight to me, he’s right-handed like I am, he’s the same physical build as I am and it’s always been close in training camps.

I spoke with my coach Billy Cusick about winning the gripping battle before I went on the mat and I did win the gripping battle the whole way through the fight but I almost thought that if I won the gripping battle I’d have won the fight and I forgot to actually win the fight.

The positive for me is that I’m not worried about getting drawn against him again because I know that I killed him, I just didn’t do enough to win the fight.

The European Championships are coming up this month but there’s no judo for me for the next week because of an ankle injury I picked up in practice. I know I’m not going to get any fitter or any stronger over the next week. All of the work’s been done over the last 20 years so another week doesn’t make that much difference and I’ll probably just be fresher going into the tournament.

It’s not ideal to have an injury beforehand but actually some of my best results have come when I’ve either been a wee bit ill and not been able to train as much as I would want or a bit injury. It might well be a blessing in disguise!

Euan

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Euan is supported by the Scottish Institute of Sport.  See his profile by clicking here.