Judo

The Cuban women's and men's judo teams leave today for Canada to participate from April 24th to the 26th in the Continental Tournament of Edmonton, qualifying for the Pan-American Games to be held next July in the Canadian city of Toronto.

Professor Ronaldo Veitia will travel with 10 disciples, including his main figure Idalis Ortiz, London 2012 Olympic champion and world champion in Rio de Janeiro 2013 and Chelyabinsk 2014 in more than 78 kilograms.

Meanwhile, coach Justo Noda will take 9 of his pupils, with special highlight for Asley Gonzalez (90 kilos), London 2012 Olympic runner-up and king of the world in 2013 in the Brazilian city.

González will reappear in a tournament after more than a year without competing due to an injury on his right shoulder, but he successfully completed the recovery phases from surgery.

The women's squad also includes Onix Cortés (70), world bronze in the Russian city, Yalennis Castillo (78), Olympic silver medalist in Beijing 2008 and bronze medal at the Havana Grand Prix 2014, and Dayaris Mestre (48) and Aliuska Ojeda (57), silver and bronze medalists in the Cuban capital.

The other 5 chosen athletes are Vanesa Godinez (44), Gretel Romero (52), Olga Masferrer (63), Maylin del Toro (63) and Kaliema Antomarchin (78).

Noda will also feature José Armenteros (100), world silver in Chelyabinsk, and Magdiel Estrada (73), 2nd in the Grand Prix of Havana.

The men's team is also made up of Roberto Almenares (60), Harold Torres (60), Osniel Solis (66), Carlos Tondique (66), Ivan Silva (81) and Alex Mendoza (+100).

Chess

Leinier Domínguez had an amazing performance and led his team when Cuba defeated Russia 2,5-1,5, sharing thus the top spot in the World Chess Team Championships underway in Tsaghkadzor, Armenia.

The win over the defending champions was achieved mainly thanks to Leinier (2 726 Elo points), who used black pieces to beat Alexander Grischuk (2 794) in 94 moves of a Tromposky Opening, because the rest of the results were draws.

Previously, the Caribbean had achieved excellent draws in the games Lázaro Bruzón (2691)-Sergey Karjakin (2757), Yuniesky Quesada (2629)-Evgeny Tomashevsky (2745) and Yuri González (2557)- Nikita Vitugov (2736).

On Sunday, Cuba tied with Hungary and now holds 3 units to lead the contest alongside Israel, India and China, squads that also tied yesterday.

Surprisingly, Israel could not beat the weak Egypt, China tied with Hungary, and India did the same with the United States.

The other winner of the day was Armenia, 2.5-1.5, at the expense of Ukraine; thus, Ukrainians, Hungarians and the locals show 2 points behind the 4 leaders followed by Americans and Egyptians (1) and Russia (0).

Today Cuba will face Armenia and the rest of the matches will be Israel-India, Ukraine-Egypt, China-Russia and USA-Hungary.

Basketball

Cuba's female basketball team will face China in 3 friendly matches, manager Alberto Zabala said.

The Cuban team, winner of the pre-Tournament of the Americas in 2013, will travel on Sunday to China to compete against the host team on April 25th, 27th and 29th, as the team is training for the world tournament to take place from September 27th-October 5th in Turkey.

The lineup is led by Yamara Amargo, the most valuable player in the Mexico's pre-tournament, and also includes Oyanaisis Gelis, Isneidis Casanova, Arlenis Romero, Leidis Oquendo, Taimí Fernández, y Marlene Cepeda, and young talents Arletis Povea, Arlenys González, Anay García, Anisleidis Galindo, Edith Thompson and Lisdeivis Martínez, Zabala told the weekly Jit sports magazine.

”Our objective is to play as many matches as possible before the world championship. I believe that after 15 preparatory matches we could move on to the next stage, since the girls will have greater confidence and effectiveness,” the manager added.