Israel’s Olympic two times medal winner Ori Sasson announced his retirement. According to the Israel Judo Association, the 31-year-old will hold a press conference on Thursday, and he is expected to receive a role within the association.
Ori Sasson won two Olympic medals, a bronze medal in the Rio 2016 personal competition, and a bronze medal in the Tokyo 2020 team competition.
Sasson is winner of European Games silver in Baku +100kg and in Kazan in 2015. In total he collected 24 World Cup medals which included 5 Grand Prix events. He opened 2019 with a victory at the Grand Prix in Tel Aviv and took gold in Budapest that year, and again gold in Tel Aviv in 2020. He won Grand Prix gold in the cities of Tbilisi (2016) and Tashkent (2017) as well. Sasson won European events such as gold in Prague, Tbilisi, Warsaw and Tallinn.
At the Olympic Games in Rio he finished with bronze but in Tokyo in 2021 he couldn’t reach the quarter finals and took a ninth place. At World Championships he was never successful in 7 events between 2013-2021. His highest position on the IJF World Ranking was third place in 2016 and was positioned in the top ten between 2016 and 2020.
The Olympic Games team event and in particular his contest against 10-times world champion Teddy Riner was his last international match. He also fought Riner in the individual tournament in Tokyo. At the European Championships in Lisbon in 2021 he fought against the current Olympic Champion Lukas Krpalek. Sasson fought approx. 250 international contests.