Jan Gosiewski and Gary Hall both put in strong performances at the weekend in a tough field at the Prague European Open on Saturday 27 and Sunday 28 February.

The Team Bath duo defeated some strong opposition to claim fifth place finishes and gain some valuable Rio qualification points.

Gosiewski (-73kg) made a good start with good wins in the first two rounds before producing an impressive victory over Turkey’s former European Championship medallist Hasan Vanlioglu to secure a place in the quarter-finals where he took on Olympic champion Mansur Isaev (RUS).

The British competitior pushed the Isaev all the way and only lost out in golden score with the Russia scoring ippon to take the contest. Dropping into the repechage Gosiewski recovered well to defeat Javier Ramirez (ESP) which ensured the British judoka would go into the bronze medal match where took on Russia’s Saian Ondar.

It proved to be tight affair with Gosiewski losing out on a single shido while also having a yuko wiped off by the officials.

A day later Gary Hall (-90kg) would also put in a strong showing including a decisive victory over Komronshokh Ustopiriyon (TJK) who came fifth at the World Championships in Astana last year. Hall would lose his quarter-final to Ukraine’s Vadym Synyavsky dropping him into the repechage where saw off Italian judoka Giovanni Carollo.

The bronze medal contest with Patryk Ciechomski (POL) went down to the wire with Hall taking the lead via waza-ari. However in the last second Hall was caught by the Polish judoka and thrown for waza-ari before being held and losing the contest.

Gregg Varey (-66kg) and Patrick Dawson (-73kg) were also in action but failed to get out of their pools.

Kim Renicks (-48kg), Amy Livesey (-63kg) and Sarah Adlington (+78kg) were competing at the Warsaw European Open at the weekend but none were able to get out of their pool.

Full results from the weekend can be found on ippon.org

British judoka will next be in action at the Lima PanAmerican Open and 5th International Judo Grand Prix Infraero on Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 March