Kevin Gauthier had an encounter with a polar bear Thursday in Prince George, and lived to tell the tale.
That bear of a man, 18-year-old Brent Betsina of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, stood in Gauthier's path to a gold medal in Thursday's Canada Winter Games judo heavyweight final and the national champion from Asbestos, Que., wasted no time finding a way to defeat him.
A minute into their gold-medal match at the Northern Sport Centre, Gauthier reached over Betsina's shoulder, locked arms and flipped him onto his back and the match was over. Gauthier, 17, stood up to salute the enthusiastic crowd and Betsina walked over to raise his opponent's arm in triumph, then wrapped up his newfound friend in a big hug.
Gauthier started the day with a win over Jeff Swadden of Alberta, then defeated Matthew Templeman of New Brunswick and Andrew Vienneau of Newfoundland/Labrador to advance to the final. His four wins in the over-100- kilogram class were all by ippon.
"All four fights today were tough for me and I'm very proud," said Gauthier. "Brent is a very good fighter and I'm proud of him as well."
Betsina earned his polar bear nickname for his powerful stature and the aggressive bounding approach he uses to track down his opponents. He locked up with Gauthier the same way but it soon became apparent he was no match for the Canadian champ.
"I was giving my best shot but I just couldn't do it, was just too tired because I just finished two matches against guys who were bigger than me," said Betsina. "He had me and I just said, 'Oh well, just take me.'"
Betsina was the only judoka from his territory and his silver medal was the first Canada Games medal for the Northwest Territories since 2007 at the Winter Games in Whitehorse, when biathlete Brendan Green won gold in biathlon.
"I pushed it, and I came up with a medal for NWT," Betsina said.
"To me, I don't care about winning a medal or not, I'm here to have fun and make new friends, like I did already. I have lots of friends now from Quebec. I used to get lots of medals when I was younger, but now my medal days are over. That's it for me, no more judo after this."
Betsina wants to focus more on school but said he will probably get into coaching judo when he returns to Yellowknife.
Meanwhile, it was a double-gold triumph in judo for Quebec's Ana Laura Portuondo Isasi (over-78kg) and her sister Adriana (up-to-70 kg). Ana Laura defeated Kelsey Painter of Alberta in the gold-medal match, followed by Adriana's championship win over Alina Fusch of Ontario. Both won by ippon.
"I'm more happy because I did it with my sister - that was the goal we had, we wanted to win together," said Ana Laura, 18, who lives with her 17-year-old sister in Montreal.
Ana Laura's final match was over early, but Adriana had more of a war on her hands against Fusch, who had a significant height and reach advantage. Fusch spun out of an ippon early on and narrowly avoided getting pinned a couple times. Both fighters were assessed three penalties in the match and one more infraction for either of them would have resulted in a disqualification. It finally ended three minutes in when Adriana got Fusch on her back.
"I was so nervous in my fight, my coach gave me a plan but with the stress of the fight I forgot things and took penalties," said Adriana. "(Fusch) is so tall and sometimes I let her put her hand on my back and I had to go on the defensive and started taking penalties, and that made me more stressed out. I tried to tighten my grip but she's so tall and I went too high and punched her in the face and I felt so bad, it was an accident.
"I'm so proud to win gold and my sister won gold too."
Kristen Yawney of Prince George went 1-2 in the women's up-to-70kg class. Yawney, 18, opened the preliminaries with a win by ippon over Mikayla Latimer of Nova Scotia, then lost by ippon to Portuondo Isasi and Keira Trotter of Alberta. Yawney missed out on a medal but said the chance she had to showcase her sport in front of a hometown crowd will make her Games experience unforgettable.
"I've never had a cheering section and my friends all came out and to hear them cheering was so uplifting," said Yawney, a member of the Prince George Judo Club. "Knowing I had a lot of support from the people here actually helped take a lot of the pressure off."
It was the second time in Yawney's career she's fought Portuondo Isasi, who scored two waza-aris for the win.
"I was a lot smarter in fighting her this time and I was able to hold her off a lot better," said Yawney. "She's national champion two years in a row and she's pretty tough."
The other gold medalists in Thursday individual competition were: Female - Up-to-78kg: Mina Coulombe, Quebec; Male - Up-to-78kg: Mohab El Nahas, Ontario; Up-to-90kg: Shady El Nahas, Ontario; Up-to-100kg: Kirill Sozin, Ontario (defeated Tavis Jamieson of Steveston, B.C.).
