It was a day of mixed fortunes at the Of Sports Centre where the Team GB judo players began their competition.
Up first was Dagenham’s Hayley Willis had a tough start to the day drawing a Belgium fighter who had previously beaten Willis earlier this year. Willis lost the fight by ippon however, as Vermandere (Belgium) progressed to the semi –final Willis was brought back into the repechage. Willis went on to win her next two matches by ippon putting her into the bronze medal match.
Willis was up against home favourite Nazlican Kilic and after a hard fought match, which went to golden score, Willis was awarded the win.
Speaking after winning bronze Willis said; “It was a disappointing start, I was hoping to do better, but was really grateful to get the second chance.
"My repechage fight was tough again, but I knew I had to make the most of it.
“It was tough playing against the Turkish girl because the crowd were really cheering for her. I am just so happy that I managed to turn things around and win bronze.”
Kieran Gehlan (Alloa) faced Spaniard Daniel Santiago in his first round match. It was a close fight but after Gehlan was thrown for a yoko it made it difficult for him to come back.
Last up for GB was Sam Hall (Sheffield) who made light work of his first two opponents winning with ippon in each. In his semi-final he came up against Skopneko, Cadet European Number One, and fought extremely well to throw him for a two waza-ari which earnt him a place in the gold medal match against Minkou from Belarus. Hall started well winning fights on attack but got caught and thrown off the sleeve to lose by ippon.
“My aim coming into the competition was to win a medal and the fact that I have done that means I am really chuffed with my performance, said Hall.
“It would have been nice to win the gold and on another day I think that I might have been able to do it but it just wasn’t to be this time around." With another gold and silver in the bag to go with the two he won on Monday, Matthew Johnson (Dewsbury) continued to lead the way in the pool with gold in the 400 metres freestyle and silver in the mixed 4 x 200 metres freestyle.
“I could get used to this,” he said with a wry grin on his face. “It’s great to be the fastest in Europe.”
Siwan Thomas-Howells (Swansea) added to Monday’s bronze medal when she joined Johnson – as well as Alex Dunk (Liverpool) and Ellena Jones (Swansea) - in the mixed 4 x 200 metres freestyle.
“I’m happy with my medal, even though I didn’t swim my best,” she said. “It feels fine when I’m in the water though, and I wasn’t far off my PB.”
The GB team proved fastest in the heats for the mixed medley, beating Russia by just a few hundredths of a second. But in the final Russia – who fielded a different line-up from the heats – were too strong.
GB also tasted success in gymnastics, where Frank Baines (Liverpool), Courtney Tulloch (Maidstone) and Dominic Cunningham (Birmingham) took silver in the team event. They were consistently good throughout, especially on the floor and the rings where they scored highest. They totalled 164.95 – but were narrowly pipped by Russia who took gold with 165.4.
After the disappointment of being knocked out of the singles competition Sabrina Federici (Bolton) and Hollie Davies (Milton Keynes) teamed up to compete in the girls doubles.The girls got off to a slow start losing 6/1 before pulling it back in the second set to win 6/4. The match went to tie break and the GB girls lost 10/7.
Lewis Roskilly (Stevenage) and Josh Paris (Highgate) competed shortly after in the boys doubles and won their first match against Switzerland convincingly 6/2 6/4. As the temperature cooled at the Bersili Tennis Complex Roskilly and Paris took to the courts for their 2nd round match against the Slovenian pair, losing 7/6 7/5.
Roskilly was also beaten by Sondergaard from Denmark in his 3rd round match 6/3 6/1.
Over at the Söǧütlü Track and Field Stadium Sophie Papps (Bracknell) stormed to victory in the 100m girls final in a time of 11.82 seconds
Papps said;
“I am absolutely over the moon to have won gold. Words can’t describe how good it feels to have won – I am just so excited.
“Everything has gone perfect since I arrived in Trabzon and I have been feeling really good and I felt it out there and all my hard work paid off.
“I have had an experience of a life time out in Turkey and this gold means it can only get better with World Juniors and the senior Olympics perhaps one day.
“Wearing the Team GB kit is such an honour and just by putting it on I felt that something inside of me lit up and it really spurred me on.”
Also winning medals in the athletics was birthday boy Leon Reid (Avon), who claimed 100m silver in a time 10.68. Gordon Benson (Leeds) also added a silver to GB’s medal tally in the boys 3000m final. Elliot Safo (Kenley) and Shadine Duquemin (St.Helier) both made it through to their field finals finishing 4th and 7th respectively and on the track James Taylor (Stoke-on-Trent) placed tenth in the 110m hurdles, Abbie Hetherington (Wigton) qualified fourth fastest for Friday’s 800m final and Robert Needham (Nottingham) finished 12th overall from 800m heats
Elsewhere, on the roads of Trabzon, Tao Geoghagan Hart (London) was Team GB’s star cyclist, finishing the 9km time trial in fourth, his time of 13:04.55 just over half-a-second off bronze.
Christopher Lawless’ (Wigan) time was good enough for 16th while Jacob Scott (Holmfirth) ended the course in 13:33.23 minutes for 37th place.