Rachel Wilding
British Olympic judoka
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Rachel Wilding (born 18 July 1976 in Woking, Surrey, England) is an English judoka, who competed in the women's half-heavyweight category.[1] She picked up a total of thirty-one medals in her career, and represented Great Britain in the 78-kg class at the 2004 Summer Olympics. Throughout most of her sporting career, Wilding trained for the Camberley Judo Club in Camberley under her personal coach and sensei Mark Earle.[2][3]
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nationality | British (English) | ||||||||||||||
| Born | 18 July 1976 | ||||||||||||||
| Occupation | Judoka | ||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.75 m (5 ft 9 in) | ||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||
| Country | Great Britain | ||||||||||||||
| Sport | Judo | ||||||||||||||
| Weight class | –70 kg, –78 kg | ||||||||||||||
| Club | Camberley Judo Club | ||||||||||||||
| Achievements and titles | |||||||||||||||
| Olympic Games | 9th (2004) | ||||||||||||||
| World Champ. | 7th (2005) | ||||||||||||||
| European Champ. | 
(2005) | ||||||||||||||
Medal record
| |||||||||||||||
| Profile at external databases | |||||||||||||||
| IJF | 53021 | ||||||||||||||
| JudoInside.com | 6577 | ||||||||||||||
| Updated on 17 November 2022 | |||||||||||||||
Judo career
Wilding was a three times champion of Great Britain, winning the middleweight division at the British Judo Championships in 2000 and the half-heavyweight title in 2002 and 2004.[4]
Wilding qualified for Team GB in the women's half-heavyweight class (78 kg) at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, by securing a place and a victory from the British judo trials in Wolverhampton.[5][6] She opened her prelim match by throwing Spain's Esther San Miguel into the tatami on a brilliant ippon and an ura nage (rear throw) with only 25 seconds left in the clock, before falling short to Ukraine's Anastasiia Matrosova in the quarterfinals with a more robust tactic.[7] Wilding gave herself a chance for an Olympic medal in the repechage round, but wasted her charm with a tough defeat from South Korea's Lee So-yeon.[8][9]
At the 2005 European Judo Championships in Rotterdam, Netherlands, Wilding recorded her career best to pick up a silver medal in the 78-kg division, losing out to neighboring France's Céline Lebrun in the final.[10][11]
