Tokyo (AFP)

Arrival in Tokyo for the gold medal, the judoka Amandine Buchard will leave with a silver medal of which the Frenchwoman did not yet perceive all the value on Sunday, divided between disappointment, pride, great emotion in memory of her past struggles. and desire for revenge, already, in Paris in 2024.

"I think this medal I will appreciate it. But my dream was to be an Olympic champion", she explained a few minutes after her superb final, lost in the Golden Score against the Japanese Uta Abe, her big rival in the -52 kg category, author on Sunday with her brother Hifumi of an incredible family double.

"We will try to be champion in Paris. I left her title at home, I'll go get mine at home," she then promised.

The meeting is not improbable because the European champion Buchard, 26, and the now Olympic champion and double world champion Abe (21), have the future ahead of them.

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And even if she wanted more, the money from Tokyo validates the past choices of the Frenchwoman and will perhaps allow the memory of the suffering of the previous Olympiad to be erased a little.

Because a few months before the 2016 Olympics in Rio, physically and mentally exhausted by repeated diets and her difficulties in staying at weight in -48 kg, Buchard had to give up the Games, before deciding to move up a category and join the -52 kg.

Today validated by the Olympic medal on Sunday, by his European title in April and by his bronze at the 2018 Worlds, this choice was first imposed only in pain and depression, during a long break of several months.

- "A beautiful day" -

“I had really, very, very little watched the Games because I was disgusted. Today, I'm still happy because I know the stages I went through in my life. I had a lot of ups. and low, very low, and I've always come back, whether judo or personal, "she said on Sunday.

"There is a taste of too little, a little frustration. But it's still an Olympic medal and compared to its career, its history, its struggles, we will savor it", confirmed his trainer Larbi Benboudaoud, coach of the French women's team and director of high performance.

The technician also knows how much the champion, once paralyzed at times by her lack of confidence, has evolved and progressed psychologically to culminate in her impressive run in Tokyo, where she never spent more than a minute on the mats at the wire of his three fights until the shock against Abe.

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“Her worst enemy is herself. From the moment she clears her doubts, she can do great things. When she came out after the final, I said to her + You had a great day +. however you know that I do not mince my words. We have nothing to reproach her with. We are happy and we are proud of her, "said Benboudaoud.

"During the + compet '+, I thought a lot about my dad (who died in 2008 from a poorly treated judo injury, editor's note) because it was the opportunity to make my dream come true, but also his. There I am a little frustrated. I come home medalist but hot, it's hard, "yet judged the Ile-de-France just after her final.

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But a few minutes later, on the podium, she still kissed that silver medal and lifted it to the sky.

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