Thirty years after that August 1, 1992, Rogério Sampaio still has an image in his head. In a kimono, ready to step onto the mat, he watched the other judo semifinals up to 65 kilos. The Hungarian József Csák faced the Cuban Israel Hernández.
“The Cuban was technical, always with a lot of strategy, and I didn’t want to fight him. He came close, trying to exploit your mistake and, when you made a mistake, you couldn’t reverse it. The Hungarian was a judoka of movement. Ideal for me” , remembers the Brazilian.
The fight lasted 20 seconds. Csák won by ippon, the most decisive blow in the sport. Sampaio felt the way was open for a gold medal that was not considered likely before the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.
Minutes later, he defeated German Udo Quellmalz, world champion, and also qualified for the final.
“Everyone in judo was focused on Aurélio Miguel, who was our Olympic champion and greatest hope for a medal. Other excellent judokas were a little forgotten. But that doesn’t mean they didn’t have a chance”, says the current president of the COB Brazil) and then coach of the Brazilian national team, Paulo Wanderley.
Miguel fell in the quarterfinals and didn’t make it to the podium. Despite Wanderley’s opinion, the day before the competition in the Sampaio category, members of the CBJ (Brazilian Confederation of Judo) technical committee told journalists that they didn’t even need to go to the Palau Blaugrana, the arena where the sport took place. . The chance of a medal was small.
This is just another component that makes Brazil’s only gold until the last day of the Games, when men’s volleyball won the decision against Holland, in a cinematic script.
“I knew that in the final against the Hungarian I had become the favorite”, confesses Sampaio three decades later.
He just doesn’t like a common comparison in sport: that the athlete who wins is because he woke up on the right foot.
“It was a magical day for me. Incredible. But I escape a little from being on a good day. Nobody has failures in preparation, it’s time to compete and is 100%. It was the day I was able to present my best as athlete. It was the moment when I had to put out everything I learned and trained for 20 years in judo”, he completes.
That only tells part of the story. For two and a half years, until January 1992, he did not participate in international competitions and was away from the sport. He was one of the leaders of the boycott against the CBJ for lack of support and structure. Judokas trained on straw mats. Sampaio recalls that the structure was almost amateurish.
He knew that coming back so close to the Games, he would have a race against time.
He also had to overcome the death of his brother Ricardo Sampaio, whom he still calls his “idol”. Also judoka, two-time South American champion and member of the Brazilian team at the Seoul-1988 Olympics, Ricardo committed suicide in April 1991.
It was on him that Rogério thought when he realized, seconds after the victory over the Hungarian, that he had won the gold medal.
“It was a very hard Olympic cycle. I was away from my teammates, from international competitions, I had the period after the death of my brother, which was a terrible loss for me. I had him as my idol and I lost the biggest reference at that moment. When I won, I wanted to talk to him and I couldn’t.”
Rogério Sampaio knew he had podium potential. He believes that when he started the boycott of the CBJ, he was among the top five in the world in his category. The question was how he could resume his career in those six months until the competition in Barcelona.
If there was any doubt, his first three fights dispelled it. He defeated the Portuguese Augusto Almeida, the South Korean Kim Sang-mun and the Argentine Francisco Morales quickly and by ippon. That not only gave him confidence but saved his energy for decisive battles.
“Rogério was a complete judoka. Every fight he [em Barcelona] was won with a different technique. He didn’t hide from the opponent and went up with different techniques”, analyzes Paulo Wanderley.
The connection between the two continues to this day. Sampaio is director general of the COB.
With each victory on that 1st of August, more people gathered in front of the judoka’s house, on Rua Espírito Santo, in Santos. His mother, Neusa, confesses that she didn’t know what to do to dissipate her nervousness and contain her joy with the proximity of the medal. When he returned to his city, Rogério paraded in a fire department car.
It was also the triumph of those who believed in the possibility of a medal even when a point of doubt appeared in the judoka’s mind.
A few months before the Games, Sampaio went to a party in Santos and decided to have a glass of beer. He argued that he would hardly be on the podium in Barcelona. So why not?
His friends didn’t allow him to drink.
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