KIMBERLEY Renicks didn’t make it to Baku. But at least she has made it back home. The golden girl of Glasgow 2014, who set the ball rolling on day one for Team Scotland with victory in the -48kg category just minutes before her sister Louise followed her onto the winners’ rostrum, competes in Glasgow for the first time in four years this weekend at the European Open at the Emirates Arena.
It is fair to say the intervening period hasn’t been struggle-free for the 30-year-old, with a shoulder problem actually sustained BEFORE the Glasgow games flaring up just months out from the Rio Olympics and leaving her no option but undergoing surgery.
Not only was she deprived of the chance to defend her title by the fact judo was dropped from the roster of sports for the Gold Coast games in 2018, she found herself dropped from funding, her failure to capture a medal in the European Championships in Tel Aviv seeing her failing to qualify for the recent world championships in the Azerbaijani capital. Currently ranked 37 in the world, she knows only the top 22, if you are the best in the country, are guaranteed of a slot for the Olympics in Tokyo, where martial arts events like judo are sure to take star billing. Now coached by her retired sister Louise, this week’s outing on home soil at the Emirates Arena are crucial to keep her dream alive.
“I put a lot of pressure on myself and mucked up a little bit at the Europeans and because I didn’t get the medal there that I needed at the Europeans I didn’t qualify for the worlds in Baku,” said Renicks. “But I have four more events before the end of the year to try to get my ranking up to qualify for the Olympics.”
Only one British judoka, Nedoka Smythe-Davis, came back from Baku with a medal and in Renicks’ case the unpredictability of the sport is both a blessing and a curse. “In my weight, the Olympic champion didn’t get the gold, it was a young 17-year-old [Daria Bilodid] who came through. But that is the nature of the sport. One wee mistake, and someone can catch you.”
Renicks is now based at Camberley judo club in Surrey, with her sister travelling down to spend a week there each month. “The shoulder has come back a lot stronger and touch wood I have been competing pretty well,” she said. “Hopefully it holds together until I retire in a few years time! There is a lot of stuff that I couldn’t do, certain moves were just uncomfortable on my body, so I stopped doing them. Now it is back, it has opened up my judo again. If I never got my Olympic dream I have still achieved a lot, taking the Commonwealth title, especially with my sister getting it as well. But the dream for every athlete when you get to a certain level is the Olympics. Just qualifying is part of it, but bringing back a medal.”
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