After spending more than twenty minutes on the tatami during the previous rounds, the Frenchman beat Tajik Temur Rakhimov, world No. 1 in the category, in less than thirty seconds.
He will face Russian competing under neutral flag Inal Tasoev to try to get an eleventh star in the world.
In the quarterfinals, Riner had dominated the impressive Japanese Tatsuru Saito, 1.91 m for 165 kilos and vice-world champion.
If he did not manage to score, he ended up cracking the Nippon on penalties during the extra time.
The Frenchman is not seeded, he had to go through a first round against the Romanian Vladut Simionescu, 25th in the world. After a slow start to the fight in which both judokas received two penalties, Riner sent his opponent to the ground at the edge of the mat at 1:47 of the end of regulation time.
In the second round, he had dominated the Pole Kacper Szczurowski, sanctioned with three penalties after 3 min 12 sec.
In the next round, he also won the penalties against Mongolia's Tsetsentsengel Odkhuu, ranked 4th in the world in the +100kg category and winner in February of the Tel Aviv Grand Slam.
Riner, ten-time world champion and double Olympic champion in individual, comes to Qatar with the desire to test himself in contact with the best judokas one year before the Paris Olympics, his big goal.
© 2023 AFP