Congratulations to Simon Chandra, Jon Bovard, and Riaz Hussain who competed at the 2018 Australian Jiu-Jitsu Championship yesterday. Simon and Jon won gold, and Riaz won a bronze medal. 3 medals from 3 competitors is a great result.
Simon won gold which made it his 4th national title in a row. I am really happy for him. He got a silver at the worlds in Abu Dhabi earlier in the year in a really good performance and to see him win gold at nationals is a good reward for his hard work.
Jon won gold in the open weight class which is a really good effort. Weighing 85kg is probably a decent weight to compete at in the open class. Going up against guys over 100kg is still a big ask but 15-20kg isn't all that bad when you still have enough strength and most of the time more conditioning than the heavier guys. Jon had prepared really well for this competition dropping a lot of body fat and body weight, and working much harder on his conditioning than in the past.
Riaz won bronze competing at a much younger age category than he is meant to. On his Facebook post he wrote "Bronze at the Australia National Jiu Jitsu Championships, no choice but to compete at
Master 2 rather than Master 5, lost to an arm bar submission by my 36 year old opponent." Giving away 15-20 years and getting on the podium is a really good achievement.
