Brazil had to wait until the third day of the Rio Olympics to get a gold medal, but it may have been worth the wait because it made Rafaela Silva’s reaction that much better.
The 24-year-old judoka held her emotions in check when she thought she won in the first minute of her match against world No. 1 Sumiya Dorjsuren of Mongolia. She even held back the emotions in the moments after she won, keeping an even temper to pay respect to Dorjsuren. But when she came off the mat, Silva broke down in tears for one of the most special moments of the Summer Games so far.
Silva is a native of the largest favela in Brazil and an easy character for the home crowd to rally behind. She had the full support of the crowd Monday with loud chants of “Rafa” throughout the competition.
After the tearful embrace with her coach, Silva jumped into the crowd where she was mobbed by Brazilians celebrating their champion.
Silva entered the Olympics at No. 11 in the International Judo Federation’s 57kg rankings, but pulled off upsets over No. 10 Corina Caprioriu, No. 9 Hedvig Karakas and No. 2 Jandi Kim on her way to the gold medal final against top-seeded Dorjsuren.
Judo has featured some other notable upsets during the Rio Olympics with Russia’s Beslan Mudranov winning gold after entering at No. 18 in the world and Zambia’s Mathews Punza somehow pulling out a victory over the No. 6 judoka despite entering at No. 112 in his weightclass.
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