SPAIN has proven itself almost unbeatable in karate this year – female world number one Sandra Sánchez has clinched a triple crown, and two of her compatriots are now world champion and reserve champion respectively.
Despite Tokyo 2020 being Sandra's last Olympics – not through choice, but because karate will no longer feature in the Games from Paris 2024 onwards – she rounds off the year with nothing left to achieve after taking every top honour in her sport.
The 39-year-old from Talavera de la Reina (Toledo province) had already won her sixth European championship before heading to Tokyo this summer, where she netted a gold medal, and was already preparing for the world championships practically as soon as she returned home from the Japanese capital.
This took place at the weekend in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and having already won it twice in her career, Sandra (first picture) made it a hat-trick by coming out top in the kata category.
It is her second consecutive world title, as she was already defending champion after winning in 2019 in Madrid.
Sandra's Chatanyara Kushanku scored her 28.46, ahead of her rival Hikaru Ono's Papuren, which earned her 27.42.
The Spaniard also beat Hikaru in the technical and athletic categories, with 19.88 and 8.58 to her fellow contestant's 19.32 and 8.1, meaning Sandra's Japanese rival took home the silver, or reserve championship.
“I'd been preparing for this world championship really conscientiously, and the effort has paid off, because the last few months have been really tough,” Sandra admitted afterwards.
“I'm so happy, I'm floating on a cloud. I never once thought I could ever achieve an Olympic gold, a world championship and a European championship in the same year.
“I've made a dream come true, and that's the reward for all the hard work over the last few years.”
Sandra Sánchez has been world number one for the past five years, and her record in 2021 shows she is unlikely to drop down the ranking any time soon.
Fellow Spaniard María Torres (second picture, by the Royal Spanish Karate Federation) got the gold in the kumite category after a tense final in the over-68 kilos classification against Egypt's Menna Shaaban Okila, ending on 5-4 to carry off her first-ever world championship title.
This hard-fought victory for the Málaga-born karateca partially made up for a bitterly-disappointing year – despite her huge efforts in preparing for Tokyo 2020, she missed out on the Games by a hair's breadth and just days before the Olympics were due to start.
And even though, at 24, María Torres would have had several Olympics left in her – at least another four, if she was still competing at the top at nearly 40 like Sandra Sánchez – karate's being dropped from the Games from 2024 means that unless anything changes in the future, Torres has lost her one and only chance of ever taking part.
Along with Spain's two 'golden girls' at the karate world championships, Andalucía-born Damián Quintero (third picture) repeated his Olympic performance, against the same rival, with a silver.
The weekend's finals in Dubai was the third time Quintero had been pipped at the post in the world championships by Japan's Ryo Kiyuna – the latter took the gold in 2016, 2018 and now, 2021, and also at the Tokyo Olympics, and on all four occasions, Quintero gained the silver.
Quintero was given 26.66 points for his Ohan Dai kata, which Kiyuna also performed and gained 28.38 points.
In the technical and athletic categories, Quintero was awarded 18.62 and 8.04, to Kiyuna's 19.74 and 8.64.
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